Originally Posted June 8, 2008

You may already take advantage of the Fill Series feature in Excel (where you can fill in a series of dates like January, February, March, etc or Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday etc.) in a simple drag of your mouse.  You an create a custom Fill list for your needs that does the same thing for your company divisions, product lines, managers, or whatever.  Here's how you do it.

In Excel 2003
1. Tools > Options...

2. Click the 'Custom Lists' tab
-In the 'List entries' field
3. Enter the first name in series that you want to have filled-in.  Be sure to type a ', ' comma and a space before typing the next name
-Continue until you  have your series complete
4. Click 'OK' when done

How to use:
1. Enter the first name in the series in cell, then press ENTER

2. Place your cursor on the cell you just typed
3. Place your mouse on the black box at the lower right-hand side of the cursor (the black box around the highlighted cell)

4. Drag across (or down) to fill-in the cells with the cells with your custom fill-in series

In Excel 2007
In Excel
1. Click the 'OfficeButton'
2. Click the 'Excel Options' button

-Under the Top Options for working with Excel section
3. Click the 'Edit Custom Lists...' button


-In the 'List entries' field
4. Enter the first name in series that you want to have filled-in.  Be sure to type a ', ' comma and a space before typing the next name
5. Continue until you  have your series complete
6. Click 'OK'
7. Click 'OK' again

How to use:
1. Enter the first name in the series in cell, then press ENTER

2. Place your cursor on the cell you just typed
3. Place your mouse on the black box at the lower right-hand side of the cursor (the black box around the highlighted cell)

4. Drag across (or down) to fill-in the cells with the cells with your custom fill-in series

That's it!