I can find no evidence that Term::ReadKey comes into play for me - and perhaps that's the secret to my success. If I stick a
in both the 'if' and 'else' branches of that sub ReadKey (and I made sure I selected the same rendition of that sub), then I don't get to see *either* of them when firing up the cpan and perldl shells. And I know that nothing changes if I remove Term::ReadKey - both the perldl and cpan shells still work exactly as before.
Notepad ... real sophisticated :-)