Question : Excel 2003 Advanced Properties hidden

In an Excel 2003 worksheet, previously I was able to open the Custom Properties sheet from the Properties item on the File menu, and work with these properties in the interface.  I also had working VBA code to read and write these properties.  Now, the Properties item on the File menu is greyed out (disabled), and my code working with custom properties doesn't work.  Any idea how to enable access to custom properties again?

I tried opening the worksheet in Excel 2007, and I had a similar problem there -- the Advanced Properties item in the workbook panel was disabled.

Answer : Excel 2003 Advanced Properties hidden

Yes, that was the case -- it turned out that the client had protected the worksheet, and neglected to tell me.  When I got the password, and unprotected it, I could get at the custom properties again.  It's strange that I was never asked for a password, though, and there were no problems working with the sheet in the interface.