>Actually, that is the problem. INSER-SQL does not effect _tally. But, according to Help it should.
>
>

>create cursor test (name c(10))
>_TALLY=99
>insert into test values ("greg")
>? _tally    && <== displays 99, not 1
>

We seems to be going in circles. According to help it shoudn't affect _TALLY unless it used with a query. See http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/8472wd76(VS.80).aspx: "The INSERT - SQL command changes _TALLY if a SQL SELECT command is used to specify the data to insert".

INSERT INTO...SELECT FROM...