LOL I think I found the fix, or at least rediscovered it if someone else already posted something. This is exactly how things played out...
I started a new game as "Bill Clinton", played 6 turns into the game.
Then my wife said it's time to eat dinner. So I hit the "ESC" key
which sent me back to my desktop, then I ALT+TAB back to the game.
Proceeded to do a "Save Game" before exiting. Started typing successfully,
so I then went to the "Main Menu" and was able to change the name "Pat Smith"
and create a new character "Barack Obama".
Was it so simple by just clicking the ESC key when on the campaign map?