Excel to the Start Menu

What if you're one of those users who never display the Quick Launch toolbar on the Windows taskbar because you don't want to waste all that precious taskbar real estate on a few crummy launch buttons? That way, you can always launch Excel by clicking the Start button (something you can't remove from the Windows taskbar) or by pressing Ctrl+Esc and then selecting the Microsoft Office Excel 2003 menu item on the Start menu.

To make Microsoft Office Excel 2003 a permanent item on your computer's Start menu, follow these steps:

1. Launch Excel and then immediately close its program window.
   You must manually start Excel in order to add its menu item to the Recently Opened section of the Start menu. To launch Excel, double-click the Excel desktop shortcut or click the Excel button on the Quick Launch toolbar. If you have neither, you have to do this by choosing Start → All Programs?Microsoft Office → Microsoft Office Excel 2003. (Doing that should give you a real incentive to complete the rest of these steps!)
2. Click the Start button on the Windows taskbar or press Ctrl+Esc to open the Start menu.
3. Right-click the Microsoft Excel 2003 item on the Start menu and then choose the Pin to Start Menu option.
4. Click anywhere outside the Start menu or press Esc to close the menu.

If a Microsoft Excel 2003 item doesn't appear on your Start menu after following these steps, the Number of Programs on Start Menu option has been set to 0. Right-click the taskbar and then select Properties. Next, select the Start Menu tab in the Taskbar and Start Menu Properties dialog box and then click the Customize button. Finally, enter a value greater than 0 (and not more than 30) in the Number of Programs on the Start menu text box before you select OK.

After pinning Microsoft Excel 2003 to the Start menu, you can always launch Excel by clicking the Start button on the taskbar (or by pressing Ctrl+Esc) and then selecting this menu. This menu item now appears in the permanent programs section of the Start menu (which is the top-left portion of the menu) along with the other permanent programs, including your Internet and e-mail applications.