OK, Charlie. No pictures, but here's how I could get a real track bass to PLAY a loop. Stay tuned for associated failure, however.

Edit/Song Form/Settings (for this song)/ UNCHECK generate two bar ending.

Options/ Preferences/count-in/select no count in.

Number of bars (my test was TWO)

Number of choruses (ONE)

Selected a RT bass in key and tempo. Soloed it in the mixer. Generated and regenerated until I had a pattern I liked.

Rendered as .wav with no lead-in/count and with Acid info.

Here's where failure reared it's ugly head. The resultant .wav always had an extra bar of silence at the end. So I took the .wav to RealBand and figured out your instructions, selected the two good bars and created a loop. Loaded that loop into Reaper and it painted in beautifully and would have played as long as I had kept painting.

So I would have to caution from my own experiment that it may be impossible to create a loop from start to finish within BIAB from Realtracks. It is also very possible that I did not set all options necessary to render only my two bars and nothing but my two bars. You can certainly get RT's to play "looping" within BIAB.

So what's the take-away, Charlie?

1. Is it possible to create loops with RealTracks? Absolutely. I hope that was never in question.

2. Is BIAB proper capable of creating loops? In my experience, it got me almost all the way there. I could set my own key, tempo, feel, and I even added a 1/8th push to the first beat of the second bar, so "groove" adjustments are also possible. I could hear it "looped". The problem came when rendering. I had to go outside the BIAB program to do an extra step on the file I rendered out of BIAB.

4. Is RB perhaps a better option for doing all the above in one program? Maybe it is. I suspect strongly that it is. Though I keep RB up-to-date, I haven't spent much time in it. Without question it is a very good tool for the actual creation of finished loops. Assuming RB can do all of those things that BIAB can do mentioned above, then it very likely IS the better option.

5. Imagination is the limit in loop creation. "The Box" can give you a lot of things that "The Box" was not principally designed to do. Use "The Box" to help you think outside the box.

I'm hoping at least for a C mark on this explanation, Charlie. Sorry for the lack of graphics.

I'd be interested in any other's experience, especially when it comes to the possibility of convincing BIAB to render without that extra bar at the end.

What I got:

https://soundcloud.com/user-47797156/2-4-120-cmajor-loop-x4/s-nRe9Wy8qObQ

Time spent--about 1 hour 15 minutes. Without hiccups? Probably 15 minutes. With lots more practice (or with RB)? Likely less than half that. And I'm slow.

Have fun.

BIAB 2021 Audiophile. Windows 10 64bit. Songwriter, lyricist, composer(?) loving all styles. Some pre-BIAB music from Farfetched Tangmo Band's first CD. https://alonetone.com/tangmo/playlists/close-to-the-ground