The outputs aren't quite what I had in mind

I don't understand. The output is exactly what you requested. 

Apples  0.5     -10     Emma:17:15:14:18
Apples  0.5     -10     Peter:2:7:4:1
Pears   0.7     -12     Alex:101:144:110:111
Oranges 0.8     -14     Shan:12:14:9:57
Oranges 0.8     -14     Heena:65:17:15:24
Oranges 0.8     -14     Rachel:1:5:18:54

[download]

...except for the second snippet. It had a bug that's now fixed.

In reply to Re^3: Parsing a table with variable columns on each line by ikegami
in thread Parsing a table with variable columns on each line by Anonymous Monk

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