Thank you both for your replys,,,,after much searching etc I ended up doing an update for Window's XP, it was indicated by Microsoft when I searched the Knowledge Base,,,,,(mind you it took me all day to work up the courage to do it),,,,it fixed the problem and I am able to access the Help files in all programs and apps I have tried so far.
So end of saga,,,,,,or so I thought unitil this morning upon boot up the same message came up that said "One of your disks needs to be checked for consistancy. You may cancel the disc check but it is strongly recommend that you continue".
So I conti