Well, Maggie, LilJoe (and anyone else), I'm really ready to start all over again, despite your valiant efforts to help save me, which I greatly appreciate. I've worked and re-worked all of these options too many times to think that doing it one more time is going to fix anything.

So my new questions are:

1. Can I "uninstall" all of the network settings on all of the computers that I've tried at this point? Do I need to change some registry entries to really get back to square one? Whatever the conflict is does not seem to be in the readily available settings options.

2. I set up connection sharing on the router many months ago. Do I need to go back that far and see if there is some conflict in settings (such as a password) that needs to be addressed? Or is even worrying about the router illogical, since the internet sharing is working just fine?

3. If I can start over, should I first work with the laptop using WMe, then add the W98 computer only if the first one works?

4. Do you have any other suggestions?

PS/ If this thread gets much longer, I may take the liberty of continuing it as a new post, with a reference to this one. OK?