So in the ongoing saga of the Lords of Kobol reminding me that those two people are right and that I'm not smart nor a good developer...there is a new kid in town. The new kid is a spoiled brat who sits in the corner and, with bottom lip firmly out, repeats "I will not fire the Paint event! I won't! I won't! I won't! And you can't make me!"
me - "What about if I call Invalidate?"
kid - "NOPE!"
me - "What if I call Invalidate (True) on the user control?"
kid - "Not even then."
me - "Okay...what if I call Update after calling Invalidate (in various forms)? How about then? Then will you fire the Paint event?"
kid - "Nunh Unh."
(I'm getting desparate...the root of which is despair)
me - "I know. How about Refresh? Surely if I call Refresh you'll be a nice kid and fire the Paint event."
kid - (laughing) "Silly old man...I won't fire that event even if you call ALL THREE! You can even try invalidating a particular region of a particular control, calling any of those three (or all) on individual controls, or any combination and permutation of calls to get the form to refresh...but I won't fire the paint event. I won't! I won't! I won't!"
So maybe someone out there can explain to me why the Paint event won't fire and/or why the OnPaint method never gets called.