Thank you to all who responded for my problems.  The restore of registry didn't work as all copies of registry available to restore had started ok, just the fact that it stopped at that particular screen.  Also the MSConfig.sys file seemed ok as per those instructions.

My brother ended up visiting and fixed the problem somehow by ticking a particular box somewhere - not sure where?????

Thanks again - this is a wonderful learning experience for me, just reading the various postings teaches me things I could never hope to learn by trial and error.

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