Why is there an invalid conversion from 'char' to 'char*' error?

Question

Arduino

Here is the code:

char *val[] = {"xxxxxxy", "yxxyyyy", "xxyxxyx", "xxxxyyx", "yxxyyxx", "xyxxyxx", "xyxxxxx", "xxxyyyy", "xxxxxxx", "xxxxyxx"};
char *a = val[0];
char *b = a[0];

Answer 1

val - array of strings = array of arrays of characters
a - string = array of characters
b - character
char b = a[0];

Answer 2

That's right - the array a is single characters, not pointers to characters.
char *val[] - array of pointers to a character - char*
char* - array of characters.