Dear James,
No, the text I am copying and pasting often is only a few words. I reinstalled the entire Office 2013. No change. I reset all the copy and paste options to "text only" in the options-advanced menu of Word. No change. It would copy and paste but with a significant delay.
Finally with you tip above about macros, I went in and changed the ctrl+c and ctrl+v to alt+c and alt+v. WORKS PERFECTLY! Obviously, I have another program installed which uses the ctrl+ shortcuts.
So, now I can work without problems but I would love to know how to find the other programs using those shortcut keys. I have a lot installed: Adobe Creative Cloud, skype, remote desktop, filemaker, epson scan, postbox, pop-up dictionaries in English and Italian, etc., etc.
Any thoughts about how to find the programs using those shortcut combos?