I have a custom Dragon command for Excel called "good bye <values> <values>.

The first time I run this command after launching Dragon, I get this error message:

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MyCommands
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The Macro contains the error:

MyCommand: "good bye 5 8"
Line:    5
Position:    0
Description: (10096) ActiveX Automation: no object currently active. -

Please use MyCommands Editor to make the appropriate corrections.
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OK   
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I clear the error message, repeat the command, and voilà! The command works, and continues to work for as long as Dragon is running.

The same thing happens the next time I run Dragon.

What might cause a command like this to fail the first time?

Not sure this is relevant, but as part of this command, I set the Reference to "Microsoft Excel XX.0 Object Library (X.X)". [The values of X depend on the Excel version.]