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The entries for all of the other rows and columns are in clue order, as stated by the preamble, with the last entry recycled if need be. Row 11 is the only exception, with the second entry recycled and the third entry appearing as the first complete entry in the row; though I suppose you could argue that the entries are still 'in order'...

s_pugh, would you be able to give me a vague hint as to one of the others you've seen? I think I may have found one in column 4 but I'm still struggling.

I have thematic items in columns 2,3 and 8 so far. 8 a poetic form of one near you, 3 fittingly at the top of the column

Well starting with the one you pointed me to, the other nine is in the column to the left. If you have Bradford's it shows in the descriptive entry. If you want any more detailed info probably best give me an email address as I don't want to spoil it for others.

Yikes! I must be barking up the wrong tree completely then, which is unnerving as I found 9 more instances on top of the one planks pointed me too. Back to square one! ;¬(

many thanks s_pugh, I'll ponder on.

On reflection I'm pretty sure I'm on the right track thanks to your initial pointer, that 9-letter word leads directly to the keyword. By taking ALL the substituted letters plus the keyword you get the theme, and one of the unclued entries definitively confirms this. Good luck, you must be on the right track as you lit the way!

All sorted - that was a sneaky one. If you need a nudge planks and Meursault feel free to ping me at spw6128 at gmail dot com. I don't want to post any spoilers more than I have to. Thanks for your help.

I have changed letters in five columns so far to get new words that all have something in common, but some of these make non-words with crossing entries, so I guess I must be completely on the wrong track. Pointer is known for leading solvers up the garden path.

That's okay Dryden - some do result in non-words across. I guess the fact that Pointer didn't specify that all words in the resulting grid would be real words is his/her defence.