Introduction and CAD Question

> trying to teach myself how to use AutoCad in my spare time. I
> haven't got very far with it, but can produce simple two
> dimensional, dimensioned, drawings. I have what ought to be a
> simple question, but I cannot seem to find the answer. How can you
> copy items (lines, text, dimensions, etc.) from one layer to
> another? All my attempts just duplicate the items on the original
> layer! Can it be done? If so how?

If you just want a copy of what of some or all of the stuff one layer
over to another then...
Type "copy" and press enter
It will ask to to select what you want to copy.
Pick lines or whatever one at a time or type "c" (for crossing)
and draw a box (pick one corner then the other). Anything
this crosses over or is in side of will be selected.
When finished selecting hit enter. It will ask for the base
point to copy from. (if you want them to be copied right on top of
the original just pick the same spot twice). An easy way to to
that is type 0,0 and hit enter and then type 0,0 again and
hit enter. Now there is a copy of what you selected right
on top of the original....but they are on the same layer.
You will need to move one copy to another layer. To do
thay type chprop (short for changeproperty) and hit enter.
It asks you to select what you want to change and it would
now be hard to select just one of the copies by clicking.... so
type "p" which stands for previous and hit enter.... this selects
all of the entities you selected last time (the ones you copied).
Now type "la" which stands for layer and type in an existing
layer you want to move them to and press enter.