Congradulations! You just re-invented CGI.pm's popup_menu(). samtregar (the author of HTML::Template) recommends using CGI.pm for this very thing. Here is a quick example (with validation!): 
use strict;
use warnings;
use HTML::Template;
use CGI qw(:standard);

my @color = qw(red green blue black purple orange);
my %valid = map {$_ => 1} @color;
my $tmpl  = HTML::Template->new(filehandle => *DATA);

my $color  = param('color');
my $select = popup_menu(
   -name    => 'color',
   -values  => [@color],
   -default => $color,
);

$tmpl->param(error => 1) unless $valid{$color};
$tmpl->param(
   colors => $select,
   color  => $color,
);

print header, $tmpl->output;

__DATA__
<form>
<p>
Pick a color:
<tmpl_var colors>
</p>
<input type="submit">
</form>

<tmpl_if color>
   <p><hr/></p>
   <tmpl_unless error>
      You picked 
      <span style="color: <tmpl_var color>;"><tmpl_var color></span>
   <tmpl_else>
      Invalid choice, "<tmpl_var color>"
   </tmpl_unless>
</tmpl_if>

[download]
Now then, you say that you use 'the same type of code to build 6 other select lists' ... why not use one function to handle them all? ;) (and don't say because they have different 'business rules' ... if that's the case, do the extra specific stuff first, then call popup_menu()). Happy coding to ya. :)

jeffa

L-LL-L--L-LL-L--L-LL-L--
-R--R-RR-R--R-RR-R--R-RR
B--B--B--B--B--B--B--B--
H---H---H---H---H---H---
(the triplet paradiddle with high-hat)

In reply to (jeffa) 2Re: HTML:Template Limitation? by jeffa
in thread HTML:Template Limitation? by digger

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