Thankyou Jeni,

yes this does help!

Jeni Tennison wrote:
>   z/a/following-sibling::*[1][not(self::a)]

The above looks the best. Seems the most self describing to me.

> 
> This will only work in a select expression because match patterns
> don't allow following-sibling:: axes.  For a match pattern, you need
> something like you have already or one of its equivalents, like:

Is it only the following-sibling:: that does not work in a match
or does any "forward" axes like following:: not work as well?
I have been using my existing version with MSXML's
IXMLDOMElement.selectSingleNode method?

 
>   z/*[preceding-sibling::a and not(self::a)][1]
> 
> or:
> 
>   z/*[not(self::a)][preceding-sibling::*[1][self::a]]

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