Thanks m_hutley and others @ https://www.sitepoint.com/community/c/javascript Thought I would make a turorial so I remember what I learned from yous , and to pass on you folks' wisdom : Try this: 1) Type something into "Copy this into Pre" textarea box . Then click "Copy this into Pre" Button . Text is copied into "Restore this from Pre" "pre area ' . And "Copy this into Pre" textarea box , is Cleared . 2) The click on "Restore this from Pre" Button , Text is copied from "Restore this from Pre" area into "Copy this into Pre" area . And "Restore this from Pre" area , is Cleared . 3) Now Type something into "Copy this into Pre" textarea box Again . Then click "Copy this into Pre" Button . Text is copied into "Restore this from Pre" pre area . And "Copy this into Pre" textarea box , is Cleared . But this time , click the "Save This Page" Button . This .html page will be saved in your Browser's download area . Since the "Restore this from Pre" pre area , is coded as contenteditable="true" , the downloaded page will save the "pre area" text as innerHTML . A nifty feature of 'contenteditable' is that upon opening the saved-page the content of "pre area" is now " hardCoded " into page . See code : So in body tag we have : "onloadRestoreTextarea()" which runs the " function onloadRestoreTextarea() " code , when page is loaded . Which copies text from "pre area" to " textarea" box . BTW: for example (see code) and note that : IF you want what’s typed in the box use .value . console.log(toConsoleLogId.value); IF you want what was hardcoded into the text box’s HTML , use .innerHTML . console.log(toConsoleLogId.innerHTML); Hope this helps someone.... http://vmars.us/ShowMe/Textarea-Save-CopyTo-RestoreFrom-onLoad-Restore.html