Can I stop Excel presuming when editting a cell anywhere else I click is a formula entry?

I am often trying to look at the formula or contents of another cell without entering that cell in a formula I'm working on, but to remind myself of the syntax or contents of that other cell. I have more trouble and lose more work by excel's default assumption that instead what i want is to insert a reference from that cell into the formula i'm editing. This is very occasionally true but I usually don't use that functionality. i would much prefer that a modifier key were required to trigger that functionality so i don't keep doing it by accident. And, if you hit a couple other cells before you realize what you have done then you don't have the undos to get rid of the mistake without retyping the formula or parts of it in the original cell.

thanks,

brian

not sure I understand what you're referring to Brian. do you have windows 10? if you do, do you know how to use the game bar to record a video? again, if you do, can you record an mp4 vid of what is happening and upload it to a cloud drive, then share the link? personally, that would allow me to help out. for instance, the same thing I did here:

excel video on google cloud

don't have windows 10. I don't know how to distinguish the modes i'm speaking of in 'excelspeak', but when you click on a cell you see its contents in the formula bar. If you click on another cell you see the contents of that cell unless you had started to edit the first cell in which case clicking on another cell puts a cell reference from the second cell you clicked on at wherever your insertion point is in the 1st formula. This drives me frickin crazy because literally 95% of the time even if I am editting a cell i am not trying to get a reference to another cell. I am trying to look at the contents of that other cell to remember how i wrote it's formula. To make matters worse, even if i remember and want to get out of editting the cell i'm in before i click on another there is no provision for my clicking return on a half finished formula. instead i get some kind of message about the formula being incorrect. no figgin kidding, i'm trying to look at another cell to remember how to finish the formula. so then i have to take the equal sign out of the cell i'm working on. this drives me crazy. any help appreciated.

Yeah, I know what you mean... and it is exceedingly annoying. The only way I can think around the problem is to not type the equal sign... just enter as text which will allow you to go to other cells, copy parts of their values, paste into your partially completed formula-to-be and then, when done, add the equal sign and press Enter.

That's what I do when I can't finish a formula is take out the equal sign, but I don't know why they can't just have an #INCOMPLETE error if you don't want to finish a formula before going to another cell. But what I would really like in combination is an add-on or widget that would only add cell references to a formula i'm editing with maybe a right click.

thanks for validating my frustration. I was afraid there wasn't a current answer to this.

figured out one small workaround. if you hit escape you come out of the cell you are editting and can go copy another even if there is an error in the formula. did this by accident but then tried it in several circumstances and i think it works.

brian