I am completely new to automation testing. After referring some tutorials, I have created an automated test case. The test case I try to automate is to check whether the sorting worked correctly after I click on one of the headers of a table.

My automated test case fails with the following exception:

```
org.openqa.selenium.StaleElementReferenceException: Element is no longer attached to the DOM
Command duration or timeout: 12 milliseconds
For documentation on this error, please visit: http://seleniumhq.org/exceptions/stale_element_reference.html
Build info: version: '2.25.0', revision: '17482', time: '2012-07-18 21:08:56'
System info: os.name: 'Linux', os.arch: 'amd64', os.version: '2.6.35-30-generic',     java.version: '1.6.0_20'
Driver info: driver.version: RemoteWebDriver
Session ID: 95b80ea0-26ac-45e0-a407-79f5b687504a
at sun.reflect.NativeConstructorAccessorImpl.newInstance0(Native Method)
at  sun.reflect.NativeConstructorAccessorImpl.newInstance(NativeConstructorAccessorImpl.java:57)
at sun.reflect.DelegatingConstructorAccessorImpl.newInstance(DelegatingConstructorAccessorImpl.java:45)
at java.lang.reflect.Constructor.newInstance(Constructor.java:532)
at org.openqa.selenium.remote.ErrorHandler.createThrowable(ErrorHandler.java:188)
at org.openqa.selenium.remote.ErrorHandler.throwIfResponseFailed(ErrorHandler.java:145)
at org.openqa.selenium.remote.RemoteWebDriver.execute(RemoteWebDriver.java:498)
at org.openqa.selenium.remote.RemoteWebElement.execute(RemoteWebElement.java:244)
at org.openqa.selenium.remote.RemoteWebElement.findElements(RemoteWebElement.java:169)
at org.openqa.selenium.remote.RemoteWebElement.findElementsByTagName(RemoteWebElement.java:240)
at org.openqa.selenium.By$ByTagName.findElements(By.java:312)
at org.openqa.selenium.remote.RemoteWebElement.findElements(RemoteWebElement.java:151)
at Sorting.sorting_column(Sorting.java:68)

```

Following is the code:

```
        //Fetching values from the column of a table
    WebElement table = driver.findElement(By.id("dnn_ctr381_View_DealerList_ctl00"));
    List<WebElement> rows = table.findElements(By.tagName("tr"));

    for (WebElement row : rows) {

        List<WebElement> cells = row.findElements(By.tagName("td"));
        if (!cells.isEmpty() && cells.get(0).isDisplayed()) {
            a = cells.get(0).getText();
        }
        b[i] = a;
        i++;
    }
    //Click on column header to sort   
    driver.findElement(By.cssSelector("html body#Body form#Form div#container.container div#Wrapper div#Main div#Panes div#ContentsContainer.box-shadow div#Contents div#Content div#dnn_ContentPane.MainContent div.DnnModule div.dnnPEMContNotitle div#dnn_ctr381_ContentPane.dnnPEMContNotitleBody div#dnn_ctr381_ModuleContent.DNNModuleContent div#dnn_ctr381_View_dnn_ctr381_View_DealerListPanel div#dnn_ctr381_View_DealerList.RadGrid table#dnn_ctr381_View_DealerList_ctl00.rgMasterTable thead tr th.rgHeader a")).click();
    WebElement table1 = driver.findElement(By.id("dnn_ctr381_View_DealerList_ctl00"));
    List<WebElement> rows1 = table1.findElements(By.tagName("tr"));
    for (WebElement row1 : rows1) {
        List<WebElement> cells1 = row1.findElements(By.tagName("td"));// Exception here
        if (!cells1.isEmpty() && cells1.get(0).isDisplayed()) 
            {

         c = cells1.get(0).getText();

       }

```

Exception is from this line:

```
List<WebElement> cells = row1.findElements(By.tagName("td"));

```

Can someone please let me know the cause of this isse and how it can be resolved?

Any help is appreciated