A "blank" or partially blank popup can be defined - it will not show till it is activated - this is a sample. Note the second procedure (OpenEditPopMenu) is the one called when the invisible popup is to be visible (menu is to be activated):

PROCEDURE DefineEditPopUpMenu(oform)
DEFINE POPUP popEdit in Window myForm MARGIN RELATIVE shortcut TITLE "Menu" COLOR SCHEME 4
DEFINE BAR 1 OF popEdit PROMPT '\<New' KEY ALT+N, "" PICTURE "popNew.Bmp" SKIP FOR lOkayForNew
DEFINE BAR 4 OF popEdit PROMPT '\<Edit' KEY ALT+E, "" PICTURE "Edit.Bmp" skip for lOkayForEdit
DEFINE BAR 2 OF popEdit PROMPT '\<Delete' KEY ALT+D, "" PICTURE "DELETE.Bmp" SKIP FOR lOkayToDelete
DEFINE BAR 3 OF popEdit PROMPT "\-"
* Note bar 5 has an incomplete prompt, to be clompleted at "activate" event
* Bar 5 will not route a process, it will simply present record specific data
DEFINE BAR 5 OF popEdit PROMPT 'Name' 
ON SELECTION BAR 1 of popEdit DO NewData
ON SELECTION BAR 4 of popEdit do EditData
ON SELECTION BAR 2 of popEdit do RemoveData
ENDPROC 

* This guy gets called when a mouse click requests popEdit to appear
PROCEDURE OpenEditPopMenu(nRow,nCol,oform)
* Here we complete the prompt for bar 5 of popEdit
lcPrompt=[Period return: ]+GetName(MyTable)
DEFINE BAR 5 OF popEdit PROMPT lcPrompt 
ACTIVATE popup popEdit at nRow,nCol
DEACTIVATE POPUP popEdit
ENDPROC

>>>Is it possible to define menu pads that can be called programmatically but are not visible?
>>
>>The short answer is yes. This used to be a popular trick for enabling Cut-Copy-Paste in apps that didn't have a Edit menu.
>
>Thank you. That is good news. That is exactly my situation.
>
>>The long answer will have to be supplied by someone else, unfortunately. I think it's just a question of defining the pad and not attaching it to a bar...
>
>Thanks again.
>
>Alex