Overview of the Problem
What a difficult chore…. I use WordPress 2.8.6 but apparently this has been an issue with earlier versions of WordPress as well. I noticed that there was no button to add line breaks. Further when I tried to add them either in the visual viewer by pressing return or in the HTML viewer by adding <br />…… I could but it was later erased by the editor. This was very frustrating because line breaks, returns, carriage, returns, or whatever you want to call them are essential to typing. How was this overlooked? I am not sure but I needed a solution.
The Answer
I began to search for answers….. I found some solutions but the one that worked for me was using a Plugin called “TinyMCE Advanced“. This plugin gives you more options for your wordpress editor. I am speaking of the interface you use to add posts. The plugin gives you more buttons and options on that interface. Once you have it installed (Plugins >> Add New) on your version of Wordpress follow these instructions.
1. Go to Settings and choose TinyMCE Advanced
2. At the bottom there is an advanced box. One of the Check boxes says:
“Stop removing the <p> and <br /> tags when saving and show them in the HTML editor“
Check this box….
Problem solved… You can also add a number of other buttons. I am currently using TinyMCE Advanced Version 3.2.4….
Here is a link which gives some other suggestions(tricks with <p> tags) that do not involve plugins…. It is also where I got my idea to use the TinyMCE Plugin…. The other solutions I could not get to work properly but maybe one of them would be better for you. Most of the suggestions can be found in the comments at the bottom of this post:
How to Add Extra Line Breaks in WordPress