Hi there, if I write out a bunch of words and alphabets on a piece of paper and then scan it, how would I highlight them individually so I can move them around?

Thanks

Scanned items will remain pixels, even in a vector based program like illustrator. You're better of moving them in photoshop and then import into illustrator.

make a new layer over it and retrace with feather. thats what i do, and it works very well.

scan image
import into illustrator
live trace (look this up in help menu)
will make your pixel/raster into Vector graphics
you can now select them/move around/change color/etc

GL