Open and Explore Excel

1. Choose Start> All Programs> Microsoft Office> Microsoft Office Excel. The Microsoft Excel program begins with a new, blank workbook displayed, this workbook exists only in memory and has not been saved to disk. By default, this workbook consists of three worksheets named Sheet1, Sheet2, and Sheet3. If you are starting a new project from scratch, you can use this blank workbook.
   
   
   
   
2. The icon at the top-left of the screen is called the Office Button. As you hover your mouse over it, a description of the Office Button functions appears. When you click the Office Button, Excel displays a list of options. Click the Office Button to close the menu if you don't want to make a selection at this time.
3. Pause your mouse over any of the three icons next to the Office Button. By default, the Quick Access toolbar functions include Save, Undo, and Redo.
4. Hover your mouse over the tabs, or task-oriented portions, of the Ribbon and a description of a tab's feature appears. The tabs are broken down into subsections called groups. The Home tab includes the Clipboard, Font, Alignment, Number, Styles, Cells, and Editing groups.
5. Click the Insert tab. The Ribbon changes to reflect options pertaining to Insert. Groups include Shapes, Tables, Illustrations, Charts, Links, and Text.
6. On the Home tab, click the down arrow under Format As Table. A Gallery of table styles appears. (Click the arrow again to close the Gallery.)
   
   
   
   
7. On the Home tab, clicking the Dialog Box Launcher on the bottom-right of the Font group opens a related dialog box Format Cells dialog box opens.