I Can Not Edit Existing Documents

In case anyone is curious, I resolved the issue, but in a very labor-intensive way. I went to each folder that held documents and changed the permissions to read only, applied this to all enclosed items, and then changed them back to read/write (which is what they were originally). This worked for items in the folder.. I then had to to it for each subfolder as well (despite having elected to apply the changes to all enclosed items).

So now all the permissions look exactly as they did at the start, but they function properly and I can edit my documents.

I appreciate your weighing in. It began the day I posted. I was away for a week, turned on my Mac and couldn't edit files. I didn't do any updates when I booted up, and I do not have system updates auto install (I have subsequently done the one system update available, but it had no effect). Also, this is not a Microsoft app problem. It affects all documents - text editor docs, pages docs, pdfs, etc...

I appreciate anyone who is willing to offer input, so I'm sorry if something wasn't clear: I never mentioned using iCloud as a backup, and in fact have no documents there; and the quoted permissions in my post were the result of the "Get Info" I performed on every folder in which I have documents. They all read "xxx(me) | Read & Write"

Yes, it includes docs saved in the home folder, but is not exclusive to them.

I HAVE an iCloud Drive, but I do not enable the "desktop and documents" feature of iCloud Drive; so none of the documents/files at issue are stored or synced via iCloud.

I mean, yes, I do use Office 365. But this is not a problem just with Microsoft products. It's all document types regardless of the application used to edit them.