@957492b3 I was with you when you described the problem, but you then lost me a bit when describing your proposed solution. People who are good at swiftly editing text on desktop don't use the mouse at all; it occurs to me that the solution would be similar on mobile. Get rid of the tap/press/drag actions altogether; stop forcing my thumbs to leave the keyboard. If cursor movement, selection and so on could be managed from the keyboard with gestures or whatever, I'd be a happy camper. 

 @1f8d831d It's a big world out there, with a wide variety of people out there (much more than 'clickers' and 'keyboarders')
My point was to rethink the foundations of text editing, get the core targeting/selection goals down so EVERYONE can benefit. If you want to have something keyboard, focused, that's great! It can be layered on top. I was just starting with the basics and showing one path where users could become more proficient.