Welcome to Lesson 1 of the Basic Microsoft Excel Tutorial. In this lesson we will cover starting Microsoft Excel and workbooks. I hope you enjoy the lesson.

Opening Excel and Workbooks

Step 1: Open Microsoft Excel

If you don’t already have Microsoft Excel open go ahead and do so by clicking on Start, then programs, and then Microsoft Excel.

Step 2: New Workbook

When you first open Microsoft Excel it will bring you to a blank workbook. Go ahead and enter in some numbers into the cells to get a feel for how they work.

Step 3: The Toolbar and Menu

The toolbar at the Excel window gives you quick access to commonly used functions such as open, save, print, formatting, etc… The menu gives you access to all functions available with Excel grouped by function. Today’s lesson will primarily use the File Menu. You will be introduced to the other menus in later lessons.

Step 4: Saving your Workbook

To save your workbook go ahead and click on File and then Save. You will be presented with a save file window. This window defaults to you’re my Documents folder. Go ahead and enter in a filename and click on save.

Step 5: Opening an Existing Workbook

To open an existing workbook click on File and then Open. You will be presented with an open file window. This window defaults to the My Documents folder. Click on the workbook that you want to open and then select open.

Step 6: Closing Excel

To close Excel you can click on the X in the upper right hand corner or you can select File and then Close.

Definitions:

Workbook – The workspace within Excel. A workbook contains multiple worksheets.
Cell – A field in a worksheet where you can enter text, numbers, calculations, etc…