Function definitions are not permitted in this context

Ok, I am new in Matlab and I am currently worki开发者_如何学编程ng on some econometric script. Before I move to real econometrics I have to create a function that selects the data that I'm interested in. Although I managed to get that script to work by writing at a very structural level, I would like this script to be as universal as possible and therefore would like to divide it into specific functions. However, when I converted all this to one function, I keep getting the error "Function definitions are not permitted in this context". Thanks in advance for your help.

function [probingArray] = extractData (data, startValue, numberOfPeriods)
    arrayHeight=size(data,1);

    for i=1:arrayHeight
        if Date(i)==startValue
            datePosition=i;
        end
    end

    n=1;

    for i=(datePosition-numberOfPeriods):datePosition
        probingArray(n,1)=n;
        probingArray(n,2)=UK(i);
        n=n+1;
    end
clear n i;

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make sure you respect matlab conventions

function [out1, out2, ...] = myfun(in1, in2, ...) declares the function myfun, and its inputs and outputs. The function declaration must be the first executable line of any MATLAB function.

from http://www.mathworks.com/help/techdoc/ref/function.html