I feel like my Blackberry has had a stroke, and I need advice on how to bring it back to good and normal health. Pressing the trackball on any and every icon always takes me to the Phone screen. When I then hit the Escape key to the right of the trackball, it types in Hl in the phone number screen and successive presses on the escape key just bring up more letters Hluououou, etc. Sometimes it comes up with a + and then an O. When I hit the red phone (hangup) on the right, I get a plus sign and eventually the home screen. Can't get to Settings to get to Options to wipe the Blackberry clean. Replaced trackball and cleaned its seating. Took battery out a dozen times. Can someone walk me through next steps? Gratefully...

Was the BlackBerry dropped or did it get wet or damp?

Has it worked in the past?

Dropped or got wet. If wet, the keyboard is very sensitive to any form of moisture.
Rain, Shower room etc.

I lightly applied an alcohol-dampened (not soaked) q-tip around the trackball to loosen it up, draw out dust. That routine has caused this to happen for a few minutes in the past, but I'm now in day 2. I replaced the trackball altogether after the first day of this. If that caused this problem, what would be the solution?

Makes no sense . If all you did was the trackball then the keys should work ok. Are you sure the alcohol did not get on any keys? Was the replacement trackball new? I would take it apart again and make sure it is installed properly.

Agree it makes no sense. First a Verizon salesman (tho I'm AT&T) kindly replaced the trackball for me, then I later took it out again and cleaned out some gunk (same lightly applied q-tip) and put the new trackball back. But still everything was scrambled.

A scrambled keyboard is a sure sign of water damage.

Thank you. As I said, if a slight amount of alcohol dabbed around the trackball can be considered water damage, then maybe that is what happened. Otherwise, this thing has been dry as the desert. Is there a suggested solution to water damage that I might try anyway?

The usual solution is to get another device. Water can damage so many components that it is hard to even try to fix the problem. Not all issues will show up at the same time.

One option would be to take the device to a repair shop an see if they can do anything. However, in my opinion, you would be better off using the repair funds to buy a new BB.

Alcohol will evaporate quickly, so i would suggest taking the battery out and letting the device sit for a day or so. But because you said it has already been several days, it may be too late (if it is water damage).

Thanks, all.for your attention and help. I'm obviously due for an upgrade and can do so in December. Just trying to keep it on life support til then. Do I hear you saying that wiping data and applications clean and reinstalling whatever won't really matter? If it might be worth trying, what's latest wisdom (and step-by-step guide) on how to do that -- but I have to be able to do it from the Desktop because I cannot get into Options on the Blackberry.