Judy Sings..., Thank you sooo much for your detailed response. It led me pretty close to what I was trying to learn, while the process also illustrated some of the issues I'm having with the iCloud service. I am a long time Apple guy (1st one was a Mac Plus), but a consumer only. Here's what I did, using your tutorial.
I logged into iCloud from Safari on my Mac book, then from Sys. Prefs. "Use iCloud for Contacts, etc." already selected. I declined iCloud Keychain (not sure about that function).
After logging into both, I was then asked for my password 3 times and carefully entered my PW each time, while still logged into iCloud on Safari. I was then prompted by the "forgot password" dialog, yet received only an "Your Apple ID was used to sign into iCloud via web browser"email, no password reset mail. Hmmm. Not sure what that was about...
I then got a "trusted device info. not available" message. No really clear on these dialogs, but I continued to be logged in on the Safari iCloud screen.
When I opened iCloud Settings/Calendar, it showed my multiple sub-calenders, with one duplicated 6 times (the same one that was duplicated and manually deleted in my prior visit). I manually deleted all the duplicates.
I opened Calendar on my MacBookPro and got "moving calendars to server account", which never resolved. After several minutes, I force quit the desktop Calendar. I then got "Core Services UI Agent would like to access your calendar". Not knowing what that was, I declined.
I opened iCloud Contacts and found all my groups duplicated there, with 3 duplicates for each contact, which migrated to my desktop Address Book, that I had manually cleaned up after my prior iCloud attempt. I deleted the duplicate groups on iCloud, which left 1 duplicate there of each contact.
One aspect that did resolve my Calendar question was from your "Archive or make copies of your iCloud data". I followed those instructions, making each of 7 sub-calendars "Public", copying and pasting to my browser, changing the header to HTTP, and downloaded each to my desktop, then changed each iCloud sub-calendar back from Public.. I then logged out of iCloud Safari and Sys. Prefs., which left 1 default desktop calendar with no entries. Opening each downloaded file added entries to my desktop Calendar. I didn't realize my 7 existing sub-calendars would not reproduce from the file. I'll need to sign in and out out of iCloud to erase my desktop Calendar app, recreate the individual sub -calendars on the desktop app (which I only have for the color coding of entries), re-open the 7 downloaded files and select the appropriate sub-calendar. I made a VCF card via iMazing from my iPhone, and will use that to repopulate my Address Book without duplicates. Then I'll sync my iPhone Calendar via iTunes. No more iCloud for me, except for Find My Phone. Too much work resolving bugs. I have a work around now, and will keep manually syncing.
I'm obviously a rookie here, but the added duplicate calendars and unexpected merging of contacts on my MacBookPro and iPhone is what keeps me off of iCloud. Sounds awesome in theory, but it results in my having to rework my Calendars and Address book every time I attempt to use this service. Whatever I may be missing is not readily apparent.
Thank you for taking the time to respond, Judy Sings. I do greatly appreciate your time!
