AIML wild card example not working

<aiml>
    <category>
        <pattern>* HELLO *</pattern>
        <template>Hello to you too</template>
    </category>
</aiml>

Should "Hello" respond with "Hello to you too" or should it only give the response when you have "randomWord hello randomWord" because the latter is what i experiencing with a blank slate bot. Should the * also man nothing? Also this bot simply repeats anything you tell it, how can i stop it doing that and give it a library of sentences to use in the event of no valid programmed response?

Thankyou

use ^ instead of * then it works and you can set new default responses were you review your bots chat history ect

I think you answered your own question.
Correct, in AIML * mean "one or many" words, and ^ means "zero or many" words.

Bot Libre has a "default" response that you can set in your bot. You can set multiple default responses and the bot will use one at random. If the bot has no default response, it will repeat the users question back to them (mimic them).
AIML has no direct concept of a default response, but you can set a "*" pattern to define a default response in AIML.

AIML wild card example not working

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