Newbie Q: What do movie clips need to allow Actionscript?

Question

Hello. Thanks for taking time out for this question.
Basically, I started an exercise in a book and it asked me to
add code to a movieclip. I created a basic circle, converted it to
a movie clip and tried to press F9 for actionscript, but Flash told
me "Current selection cannot have actions added to it".
When I looked at the example file that came with the book, I
couldn't see anything special about the movieclip that was used.
What am I missing?

Answer 1

However, the techniques of adding code directly to movie
clips is an old and outdated way of coding. And I would advise that
if you are serious about learning Actionscript that you don't go
down that road.
AS 2 is perfectly useful and good so learn that or learn AS3
(or both!), but here is a link to an article about the issue:
http://www.quip.net/blog/2006/flash/museum-pieces-on-and-onclipevent
David Stiller (that is his blog) posts here often and is a
great source of information. You might want to check out more of
his articles.
It could be that your book is just showing one way before
moving on to a more sensible approach, but check the examples
toward the end. If they are full of on() and onClipEvent() I woudl
recommend getting a different book.