Network Manager question

[Timothy Murphy]

I'm running Fedora-17/KDE on my laptop.

I lost the connection to my WiFi router
when I was in a rather distant room
(though "iwlist scan" could see the router)
and as a consequence I got the message
=====================
Secrets for linksys - KDE Daemon
The network linksys requires authentication
[Text area]
Show password   OK Cancel
=====================
every two minutes or so.
However, I COULD NOT WRITE in the text area indicated.

I remember suffering from this some time ago,
but I thought the issue had been sorted out.
I don't really understand how an application
can ask for a password, and yet not allow one to be entered?

I suspect the culprit is a KDE program
that is supposed to be "helping" NM.
I'm not sure why NM needs this help?