Hi,
I write as a hobby and began writing a short story back in October in MS Word 2013. However, since many family members use the laptop as well, I wanted to be sure no one would go snooping through my files and begin reading it, as they complain I never let them see my work. With that in mind, I password-protected the file so no one could open it. Unfortunately, time got away from me and life happened, so I have not touched the file in months. I went back to it last week hoping to continue, only to be hit by the prompt for a password--the problem being that I can not find the notebook that I wrote the password in. I fear I may have thrown it out by accident.
So, long story short, I've lost the password to my Word file and can not remember it for the life of me. Are there any tips on how I can get around the system to remove the password and open the file, or at the very least make the file "read-only"? Or am I going to have to shove out some money for password recovery software? Any and all feedback is greatly appreciated. Thank you in advance.