Can Automator help me set up a "simple" macro in TextEdit? And how?

Question

A TextEdit macro. A simple macro. That's all I want. I'm sure it can't be that hard, but I'm missing a big step.
I do the same thing with many TextEdit documents: Find and Replace one text string; then Find and Replace with a different text string; then a few more times. It's the same text string every time I use the file. It basically takes 2 minutes each time, but I'm doing this five times a week, and a macro to make it take 2 seconds would be really nice. (After all, it's what I was doing in WordPerfect twenty years ago.)
I can record the actions in Automator, but then that won't work unless I have the relevant TextEdit file in exactly the right place. And now I'm scared because I experimented with a file in a different location on the desktop, and totally lost control of the computer - and eventually had to turn the computer off.
There must be an easy way to do this. When I have an open TextEdit file, I want to do one keystroke, or 1-2 mouse clicks, and then have all the strings get replaced.
What am I missing? Most of the introductions seem to take me to procedures much more complicated than I want.
For example:
Command-F (for Finding)
Key VocabularyˆReturnˆReturn (<--the string I want to replace)
[Tab] (<-- to get to the replace with field)
--------ˆReturn (<--and what I want to replace it with)
Replace All
Command F
ˆTab (<--all the tab stops I want to replace)
[Tab]
[space]/[space] (<--and what I want to replace them with)
Replace All
Thanks for any help you can offer, and my apologies for what I suspect is a really stupid question.

Answer 1

A TextEdit macro. A simple macro. That's all I want. I'm sure it can't be that hard, but I'm missing a big step.
I do the same thing with many TextEdit documents: Find and Replace one text string; then Find and Replace with a different text string; then a few more times. It's the same text string every time I use the file. It basically takes 2 minutes each time, but I'm doing this five times a week, and a macro to make it take 2 seconds would be really nice. (After all, it's what I was doing in WordPerfect twenty years ago.)
I can record the actions in Automator, but then that won't work unless I have the relevant TextEdit file in exactly the right place. And now I'm scared because I experimented with a file in a different location on the desktop, and totally lost control of the computer - and eventually had to turn the computer off.
There must be an easy way to do this. When I have an open TextEdit file, I want to do one keystroke, or 1-2 mouse clicks, and then have all the strings get replaced.
What am I missing? Most of the introductions seem to take me to procedures much more complicated than I want.
For example:
Command-F (for Finding)
Key VocabularyˆReturnˆReturn (<--the string I want to replace)
[Tab] (<-- to get to the replace with field)
--------ˆReturn (<--and what I want to replace it with)
Replace All
Command F
ˆTab (<--all the tab stops I want to replace)
[Tab]
[space]/[space] (<--and what I want to replace them with)
Replace All
Thanks for any help you can offer, and my apologies for what I suspect is a really stupid question.