That is a critical point. The ad branded the name "Orville Redenbacher" as “Orville Redenbacher’s Gourmet Fresh Microwave Popcorn.” This is easily confused with "Orville Redenbacher's Gormet Popping Corn" which is a popular brand (see http://www.orville.com/) with a less intuitive name, and which a good number of kids have, in fact, eaten.

Thus this is more evidence of ads causing brand confusion than memory implantation. And underscores the importance of an insight that is already in trademark law - that people will easily mix up a brand that is similar to an existing brand with the existing brand.

>“Orville Redenbacher’s Gourmet Fresh Microwave Popcorn.” This is easily confused with "Orville Redenbacher's Gormet Popping Corn"

These are not really great examples of brand confusion IMO. In the name "Orville Redenbacher" is considered the origin whilst the remainder of the name is the particular product. Both of these are claiming the same origin (company/person). This isn't brand confusion based on similarity it's a direct rip-off. To make that point clear the consumer isn't confused about the origin they have been conned. Maybe it's a bit of an esoteric point.

Gourmet Fresh Microwave Popcorn and Gormet Popping Corn are two different products in two different geographic regions.

It looks like a pretty clear case of semantic confusion. When the article named it, I just assumed that was the actual name of Orville's standard Gourmet popcorn. Both the real and fictional names are a mess of generic advertising words, neither particularly memorable or distinct unless you're keenly interested. Most people won't even look beyond the "Orville Redenbacher"on the title barring searching for a specific descriptor, like "Gourmet" or "Kettle Corn," because those are the only meaningful terms that will pop up on the box of a popcorn.