Scaling a text box in Illustrator CS6 (without scaling text)?

Question

Ok, I have a fresh Illustrator document. Pasted some copied text into the "artboard" (the clipboard is severely broken, but that's for another day). The textbox that gets pasted is one huge line that goes from here to Timbuktoo. So I need to resize it to 1/3rd of the page. I presume, as happens in every other sensible tool in the world, the text would flow to the width I give the textbox. The text itself will NOT get resized. However, this is not what happens. THe text gets scaled completely. No exceptions. I've been googling for the last 2 hours. Nothing works. 1. Some posts say I must "show bounding borders". Doesn't help at all. 2. Other posts say some nonsense about main selection tool and direct selection tool. These tools do nothing. Both the arrow-icons, when used to drag the corners of the box, lead to the text getting resized anyway. 3. Someone suggested that when I copied and pasted text from a text file into Illustrator, this became an object, not actually text. Well, in that case, how should we paste text? Not everyone working on an Illustrator document is always and forever expected to *write* all the text manually, is it? Seriously, how does this work? Any preferences I need to change? I used to work with CS4 and I recall it was much easier. Would appreciate any inputs. Thanks!

Answer 1

Before you paste your text into Illustrator, grab the text tool and draw a text box. Make sure the cursor line is flashing inside the box before pasting your text into it.

Don't click anywhere else after you paste your text. If you do, you will deselect the text box. In which case, double click inside of the text box to edit it again. Once your cursor is flashing inside the box, you will be able to move the text box handles around to resize the box.

To change the size and font for your text you need to highlight the text inside the box to make the changes. You will need to readjust the text box to make it all fit in the space you have for it.

If you still have issues with this, schedule a lesson with me so I can show you on the screen.