I am very new at access and need to know how to manually insert todays date into a field using, say (control and d keys)and I would like that date to remain unless I did another ^d. thank you

In the Date fields property sheet select the Data tab and in the field "Default Value" put this: "=Date()" (without the quotes). When you move to a new record the current date will appear in the field. You will be able to type over it or change it if you like.