Referencing a cell causes excel to focus on the search box

[Daveycarey]

When referencing a cell in another sheet in the same or external workbook excel defaults to the search box after selecting the cell to be linked and does not allow me to use the enter key to finalise the formula I have to click above the ribbon to remove the cursor from the search box and then press enter. Very frustrating and seems to have just appeared as a glitch in the last couple of months. Anyone else experienced this or have a workaround?

using excel 365 on MacBook Air M2 

TIA

[#2]

In Windows Excel you can set an option to minimize the size of that search box, perhaps you can do that in Mac too?