word automation from vb6

Thanks guys, but I have not found either of the suggestions provided here truly helpful. I ended up solving it myself as follows:

Sub MakeDoc()
Dim oWord As Word.Application
Dim oDoc As Word.Document
Dim oRange As Word.Range
Dim sTemp As String
Dim p As Integer
Dim oTable As Table
Dim X As Integer
Dim Y As Integer
'variables for rendering of Tables:
Dim NumT As Integer 'the number of the table we have to render eg if there are 5 tables, they would be numbered 1-5
Dim NumColsT As Integer 'the number of columns the table has
Dim TitleT As String 'the title of the table

List1.Clear

Call MakeTables this is a sub not shown here, that does two things: a) puts into a list the following parameters for each Table we want in the report: Number of table;Number of columns in table;Title of table b) populates a variable: TableTxt() with the contents string for each table

Set oWord = CreateObject("word.application")

'first, let us create the header
Set oDoc = oWord.Documents.Add
oWord.selection.TypeText "MY REPORT "
oWord.selection.InsertParagraphAfter
oWord.selection.InsertAfter "Report created at: " & FormatDateTime(Now())
oWord.selection.InsertParagraphAfter
'oWord.Selection.InsertParagraphAfter

Set oRange = oWord.ActiveDocument.Range(Start:=oWord.ActiveDocument.Paragraphs(1).Range.Start, End:=oWord.ActiveDocument.Paragraphs(1).Range.End)
oRange.Font.Size = 20

Set oRange = oWord.ActiveDocument.Range(Start:=oWord.ActiveDocument.Paragraphs(1).Range.Words(1).Start, End:=oWord.ActiveDocument.Paragraphs(1).Range.Words(2).End)
oRange.Font.Bold = True

Set oRange = oWord.ActiveDocument.Range(Start:=oWord.ActiveDocument.Paragraphs(1).Range.Start, End:=oWord.ActiveDocument.Paragraphs(2).Range.End)
oRange.Font.Name = "arial"

'now let us insert each table into the document
For X = 0 To List1.ListCount - 1

in the following, Splitter is just a function I wrote to split each string in List1 at the semicolons (each string specifies parameters for each table)
NumT = Splitter(";", List1.List(X), 0)
NumColsT = Splitter(";", List1.List(X), 1)
TitleT = Splitter(";", List1.List(X), 2)

p = oDoc.Paragraphs.Count
oDoc.Paragraphs.Add
Set oRange = oDoc.Paragraphs(p + 1).Range
sTemp = TitleT
oRange.Text = sTemp
oRange.Font.Name = "arial"
oRange.Font.Size = 12
oRange.Font.Bold = True
oDoc.Paragraphs.Add
Set oRange = oDoc.Paragraphs(p + 2).Range
in the following, the array TableTxt() got filled in the MakeTables sub. It is the actual data to put in each table
sTemp = TableTxt(X)
oRange.Text = sTemp
oRange.Font.Name = "arial"
oRange.Font.Size = 12
oRange.Font.Bold = False
this converts the appropriate string into a table:
Set oTable = oRange.ConvertToTable(Separator:=Chr(59), NumRows:=1, NumColumns:=NumColsT, Format:=wdTableFormatGrid3, ApplyBorders:=True, ApplyShading _
:=True, ApplyFont:=True, ApplyColor:=True, ApplyHeadingRows:=True, _
ApplyLastRow:=False, ApplyFirstColumn:=True, ApplyLastColumn:=False, _
AutoFit:=True)
    For Y = 1 To NumColsT
    oTable.Cell(1, Y).Range.Bold = True
    Next Y

Next X

oWord.Visible = True