How to stop Highlighting

I'm not sure what you are saying. I will write a sentence or paragraph and then everything I write below it will continue to highlight. I have tried everything. The escape button won't stop it. I have tried no color as well as stop highlighting. The Stop Highlighting will never engage.

Thanks for the follow-up. I was asking if you were referring to Text Color Highlight or something else.

I think you are describing Text Shading. Like italics or underline, it will be activated and then stay activated until you turn it off. Select the affected text range and then click the arrow on the border button in the Paragraph group on the Home tab.

Go to the Shading tab in the Borders and Shading dialog box.

Make sure that "Apply to" is set to "Text" and that "Fill" is set to "No color." Confirm with OK.

If necessary, repeat the procedure but choose "Paragraph" (instead of "Text") in the "Apply to" drop down.

Are you referring to the Text Highlight Color tool on the Home tab? You should be able to dismiss it by pressing the ESC key.

On the other hand, if you are saying that the problem is with selecting text, maybe Extend Selection has become activated. Pressing the ESC key will be helpful for that as well. You can right-click the status bar and choose to enable the Selection Mode option; this will show you if Extend Selection ever becomes active again.