8. An interactive message editing method, comprising: maintaining a database containing data representative of a plurality of media objects and of a plurality of data strings each associated with one or more of said media objects; storing multimedia message data entered by a user via a user interface; parsing said message data on the fly for identifying successive character strings; comparing each of the character strings with data strings in the database; presenting on a display device one or more media objects associated with a data string in the database that at least partially matches a character string; and embedding a selected media object in spatial association with the associated character string; wherein, for each of the media objects associated with each data string in said database storing a respective rank depicting a nominal preference to be accorded to each media object matching the respective data string; and adjusting the respective ranks of matching media objects in response to successive manual selections of displayed media objects and updating the database accordingly.
8. An interactive message editing method, comprising: maintaining a database containing data representative of a plurality of media objects and of a plurality of data strings each associated with one or more of said media objects; storing multimedia message data entered by a user via a user interface; parsing said message data on the fly for identifying successive character strings; comparing each of the character strings with data strings in the database; presenting on a display device one or more media objects associated with a data string in the database that at least partially matches a character string; and embedding a selected media object in spatial association with the associated character string; wherein, for each of the media objects associated with each data string in said database storing a respective rank depicting a nominal preference to be accorded to each media object matching the respective data string; and adjusting the respective ranks of matching media objects in response to successive manual selections of displayed media objects and updating the database accordingly. 10. The method according to claim 8 , including selecting one of multiple default media objects for display if a character string matches multiple media objects of the same type and the same rank.