Get rid of an unwanted line

I had an interesting experience over the weekend that resulted in this tip. Here’s how it started. I wanted to put three asterisks at the end of a paragraph to separate something in a document.

asterisks-in-doc

But when I hit enter, Word inserted this decorative line.

asterisks-made-line.jpg

Ordinarily, I could have just hit undo or pressed Ctrl Z to undo if I didn’t want the line. But I had to close the document and reopen to get back to it later. And I could not get rid of that line. I could not select and delete it. I could not backpace it out of the way. All I could do was push it down the page.

The problem was, Word didn’t see that line as a line. It sees it as a border. Here’s how to get rid of it. Park your cursor just above the line.

Click the Home tab in word.

word-home-tab.jpg

Then find the Border icon.  It’s a little square beneath the Help tab with a drop-down arrow next to it. Click that arrow.

border-icon.jpg

Choose No Border from the drop-down menu.

no-border.jpg

It will disappear.

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