Welcome to the forum!
What are you using? The LPE or extension?
You said "....and then make a pattern along path tool....". I'm just not sure what you mean there. The reason it's important, is because if you're using the extension, the pattern and the path have to be arranged in a certain z-order. That's explained on the Help tab of the extension dialog.
If you're using the LPE, you have to apply the PAP LPE to the path first. And then use either the Paste button or the Clone button in the PAP LPE dialog. Ctrl v or the paste button on the command bar won't work.
While it will work to use the path created from the text, you might like the appearance better if you used to short, perpendicular paths to make the plus sign. But either way will work. They'll just have a slightly different appearance.
