[Language idea] print formatting - add to highest level

[LeslieMurphy]

Language idea incl level
My goal was to write a multiplication table!

To make it appear nice we need to pad the shorter numbers so everything aligns.

I got it to work, but the code is a bit convoluted!

Need some sort of language function like this - which I know is way too complex for children, but maybe we can come up with a syntax?
Another concept that could help would be a print without a newline.

Ideas for hedy (I am a very poor language designer!)

print myvalue with 4 positions align left # adds crazy verbose syntax to the language :-(
print xxxx without newline # more verbose ugly syntax 
print myvalue picture "ZZZ9" # this is supported by COBOL !!!!  Zero suppression
print format(myvalue, "{:4d}") # allow any Python format to be used
or support tab stops and automatically right justify the columns) # need a directive in the language to declare the tab width(s)
set tabwidths = {5,10,10,10,10} # introduces a special variable in hedy and support for escaped \t

Example in Python

print("{:4d}".format(val) , end =" ")

Additional context

print '    1   2   3   4   5   6   7   8   9'
print '_____________________________________'
for counter in range 1 to 9
    padding0  = '   '
    padding1 =  '   '
    padding2 =  '   '
    padding3 =  '   '
    if counter >= 2
        padding3 = '  '
    if counter >= 3
        padding2 = '  '
    if counter >= 4
        padding1 = '  '
    if counter >= 5
        padding0 = '  '
    print counter " | "  counter padding0 counter*2 padding1 counter*3 padding2 counter*4 padding3 counter*5 padding3 counter*6 padding3 counter*7 padding3 counter*8 padding3 counter*9