They don’t work…what’s up with that….
Works fine
You just got to be careful not to highlight the space next to the next word, if you see what I mean. Highlight just the word(s) and it works fine.
OH I SEE
OH I SEE
Now I really see
What The Heck?
I swear, it didn’t work last nite…. 
I can never figure out how to work those suckers.
It’s the same with linking to a web address, you just have to make sure that you don’t highlight the space around the word you want to link.
I've used the bar at the top many times when I've got the advanced post editor option enabled.
You sure you were using the right one?