The bay of pirates is harder than ever to use Microsoft Office "Ahoy There Matey" edition, because now Office wants to sign into a Microsoft.com account in order to work in anything but read only mode.
That's what they are working towards (even for boxed product). So if your email address doesn't have a legit version of office associated, you'll get caught out as a pirate and the software will function in read only mode.
Why do people need Microsoft office at home anyway...?
I use it quite often, in particular Outlook for my email, and Excel (for budgets, comparisons buying stuff, lists, etc).