I saw 2 other answers on here that had different parts of that - one had ComboBoxName.Items.GetItemAt(ComboBoxName.SelectedIndex).ToString();, which looks similar but doesn't cast the box to a DataRowView, something I found I needed to do, and another: ((DataRowView)comboBox1.SelectedItem).Row.ItemArray[0].ToString();, used .SelectedItem instead of .Items.GetItemAt(comboBox1.SelectedIndex). That might've worked, but what I settled on was actually the combination of the two I wrote above, and don't remember why I avoided .SelectedItem except that it must not have worked for me in this scenario.