Load from textpad - text problems

I’m loading some text from a textpad. The thing is there is a paragraph and it starts off like so:

“news = New R&B”

R&B means like the music type. When I use flash to load it, the “&” makes flash think B is a variable so it sort of messes up the loading.

Is there a way to put the character & in the textpad without just typing it?

How would I put links inside the textpad so it shows up as a clickable link in flash?