how do you copy a selected highlighted piece of text on this darn machine? when you highlight then press command p, it then comes up as print options but there is no selection option.
As far as I know there is no direct function to print selections on a mac (unbelievable I know!)
You can get round it by selecting the text you want to print, then clicking on the name of the program you are running in the top bar and selecting services > texedit > new window containing selection. you can then print your selection from the texedit window.
There is a nice little free add on which will do much the same thing with a three key shortcut, it's called Print Selection Service from http://www.schubert-it.com/free/ basically does what Chuck has outlined but without the intermediate steps.