Lets say the data is in Cell A1 to A15

Non VBA Method

=CountA(A1:A15)

The above formula will give you the number of cells which has alphanumeric values in the cells. If you want to exclude the two cells which have XICOOMM then the above formula becomes

=CountA(A1:A15) - 2

VBA Method

Application.WorksheetFunction.CountA("A1:A15") will give you the same results as above. Subtracting two will be required if you want to exclude the cells which contain XICOOMM.

Hope this is what you wanted?