I'm working on my household budget and
I've entered all of my bills for the
last two months
now that I have my information entered I
can clean up my worksheet a little for
example some of the text in column a
goes beyond the column marker I can
easily make the column wider just
position the cursor over the column line
right in the column heading and the
double arrow will appear left-click the
mouse and drag the cursor to the right
to increase the column size release the
mouse button
when the column is a desired size it's
bigger now but I think it's a little too
big I can decrease the column size the
same way but this time I'll just drag
the cursor to the left there that looks
a lot better some of the names of the
months don't quite fit in the cell
either and I can increase the column
width on these too now I can manually
adjust the column marker like I just did
for column a or I can use a format
command to adjust the column width just
select the column you'd like to modify
and then click the format command in the
cells group on the Home tab a menu
appears with a lot of options from this
menu you can change your row height and
your column width if you click column
width a dialog box appears that allows
you to enter a specific size for the
width I'm not sure how wide I need it to
be so this won't work
however the autofit column width adjusts
the column just enough so all the text
will fit just left click the menu option
to select it and now you can see that
the column adjusted in the worksheet
right now the height of the rows in the
spreadsheet looks okay but there may be
times when you want to increase or
decrease the height of your rows this
works the same way as the columns for
example let's say I want to increase the
height of Row 1 after all it is my title
I do want it to stand out all you have
to do is hover your cursor over the row
line you want to move
once the double arrow appears left click
and drag your mouse I want to make this
row taller so I'll drag the row line
down you can drag the line up and down
until you get the size you like and just
like the columns you can format the rows
by clicking the format command in the
sales group on the Home tab from the
menu you can select row height to enter
a specific cell height or auto fit row
Heights to adjust the row height to the
same size as the text you may also find
that you need to sometimes insert rows
columns and cells for example I just
realized that I forgot to include my car
insurance in my budget instead of adding
it to the bottom of the list I'd like to
put it above my car payment
all I need to do is select row 9 then
click the inserts command the new row
always appears above the selected row
and now I can type in my text one word
of caution make sure that you select the
entire row below where you want the new
row to appear and not just the cell for
example if I want to insert a new row
above rent and I only select cell a8
instead of row 8 it won't work quite
right you see now if I click the insert
command only a cell will be inserted
instead of a row so I'll just click undo
select the entire row and then click
insert
you can also insert columns easily I
want to change the dates column to
August due dates and then insert a
column next to it where I can type yes
or no if it was paid each month I'll
change this information when you insert
a new column into a worksheet it will
appear to the left of the column you
select since I want my new column to
appear here to the right of the due date
column I need to select column C and
then click the insert command there you
go
deleting rows and columns is as easy as
adding them just select the row or
column you'd like to delete and click
the delete command on the Home tab I do
want to keep this row so I'll click undo
just be careful to select the entire row
or column you want to delete if you only
select a cell and then click delete only
the cell will disappear Excel gives you
several different ways to insert cells
and rows and you'll learn more about
these as you use Excel I think I've
shown you the simplest way to add and
delete rows and columns but feel free to
explore some of the other options as
well if you click the down arrow next to
the insert and delete commands you'll
see some other menu options I'm going to
really quickly add a few more rows that
will help me organize the budget into
categories
the best way to learn how to insert and
delete rows columns and sales is to
practice using them have fun