About Symbols
A symbol is a container used to build your props, puppets and looping clips. You can use symbols to contain artwork and animation and manipulate them as a single object. You can also use symbols as a placeholder in which you place a series of different drawings for each body part of your puppets or when you have a repeating cycle. However, symbols are not necessary for creating characters.
When a symbol is exposed in the Timeline view, the symbol's cells are represented as a movie strip.
When you enter a symbol to edit it, you are entering another scene with an independent timeline. You can nest many symbols one inside the other. To help you follow the hierarchy of your nested symbol, take note of the Editing stack at the top of the Camera view which displays the path to your symbol's location. You can click on the symbol's name to move up the chain.