don't know how/where to go to enable me convert pdf files to writable, Word files that still retain original formatting.
That's an illusion you should quickly write off. Even under ideal conditions trhere will be formatting errors that need to be fixed manually and then depending on how the PDF was constructed in teh first place, you may still end up with lumps of isolated text blocks and other stuff. The rest is not quite clear since you didn't mention what you actually downloaded on what system. Assuming you mean Acrobat, it's as simple as File --> Save As --> Microsoft Word.
Mylenium