Hi Mike, if you go and select one face of an object you can then use Ctrl+A / Select All to select all faces of that object.

That will select all the faces of that object though, not just ones directly connected to it. The only time you should end up with one object that has different groups of surfaces in it is a hollow object that has an inner void area in it that is not connected to the outer surface. Is that the kind of thing you're working with?

- Michael