paragraph marks will not disappear in Word

Greetings knowledgeable people,

I cannot make the paragraph marks (pilcrow) disappear in my word documents.

I am well versed in using the hide/show button for these marks in the standard Home ribbon. Clicking the button does nothing to the visibility of the marks (see below) when it always has before.

Closing and restarting does not change anything.

OS Catalina on a networked macbook, using MS Word in Office 365

All help appreciated

. .