Just trying to reinforce what I'm learning here about a Function returning an array. I still think I need some advice. What I want to do is to pass a string to the function which will parse it into it's parts and assemble it into an array. If I can get this to work it will be one less temporary text file I need to write.

Here is what I have so far but I don't understand the error I'm getting shown in red.

Code:
Option Strict On

Public Class Form1

    Private Sub Form1_Load(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles MyBase.Load
        Dim vWord() As String
        Dim Message As String = "id=7-1234567890&" & _
                               "field1=40&" & _
                               "field2=43&" & _
                               "field3=0&" & _
                               "field4=0&" & _
                               "field5=0&" & _
                               "field6=0&" & _
                               "field7=0&" & _
                               "field8=0&" & _
                               "field9=300&" & _
                               "field10=0&" & _
                               "field11=0&" & _
                               "field12=1&" & _
                               "field13=1&" & _
                               "field14=1&" & _
                               "field15=0"
        Message = Mid(Message, InStr(Message, "id="))
        vWord = CType(Doit(Message), String())

        For i As Integer = 0 To vWord.Length - 1
            TextBox1.Text = TextBox1.Text & vWord(i) & vbCrLf
        Next

    End Sub

    Private Function Doit(ByVal Message As String) As Array
        Dim words As String() = Message.Split(CChar("&"))
        Dim word As String
        Dim vWord() As String = Nothing
        Dim count As Integer

        For Each word In words
            vWord(count) = (word.Substring(InStr(word, "=")))  <<--Object reference not set to an instance of an object. 
           count = count + 1
        Next
        Return vWord

    End Function
End Class