I am confused about custom properties of classes.

In a class I tried out, I have these two properties that I do NOT want the user to change - oldleft and oldtop. I can make them PROTECTED and then the user cannot change them. But when I try to access them outside the PARENT eg if I have a cmdButton on the form and need to access these properties from its CLICK Method -

THIS.PARENT.oldtop = 10

I get the error that the property was not found.

If I create a custom method for the class then I can access this protected property from it

THIS.oldtop = 10 is OK!

How do I get to these properties (PROTECTED) from methods whithin other members of the same class??

I can find no sample code to help me here.

So THIS.CustomProtectedProperty is OK but

THIS.PARENT.CustomProtectedProperty gives error property not found.
The same with HIDDEN. I can only acces these properties if I make them PUBLIC which defeats the purpose.

Can someone help as it is driving me crazy.

Bernard
boutb@powerup.com.au