How to detect edit mode in IWP?

The status area is too confusing for my IWP end-users so I want to get rid of it and replace it with my own buttons. The one question I have is how to detect when a user has clicked into a field so that I can replace "Add" and "Find" buttons with "Save" and "Cancel" buttons? This is how IWP operates with the Status bar.

I can see how I could create a layout with all fields locked out until a user clicks on an "Edit" button that could call a different layout with Save & Cancel buttons and editable fields but that seems a bit clunkerish. It'd be nicer to know how to detect when the user clicks in a field.

Thanks,

Will