I found what was causing the problem. My SQL statement was Select A + B as C, so that the combobox will show the value A and the description B. However, the resulting C is larger than the control source which is only wide enough for A. This was causing the display value for the combobox to be empty. It works OK if my SQL statement is Select A by itself.

So now I have a working combobox which does display A after choosing a value from the drop-down.

But I need to show the description B for each A. My problem now is how do I show both A and B in the drop-down list and still keep only A in the controlsource?

Thanks for all your input. If you have any inkling of how to do this, please send it.