Interesting. Let me ask you something that you might be able to answer. All of my internet problems started when I was using Verizon. Verizon couldn't fix the problem, which is why I told them to cancel at the end of the billing cycle, and I went with Cox. The weird thing is, I never do Windows updates. They always seem to create a problem. But when the bubble popped up a few weeks ago, it told me I had 115 new updates I needed to install. So even though I rarely if ever do it, I went ahead and did it. And then the problems started. Is it possible that all of these problems were created by a Windows update? If so, could I just do a system recovery and reset my system to factory settings and be good to go? I know how to do that, and even though it's time consuming and a total pain in the ass, because I always lose about half of my favorites and stuff even if I save them to a flash drive, I would much rather do that if it would solve the problem than attempt something I have zero knowledge of.
And just so I don't forget, thanks a ton for all of your help. I was completely lost, and having a direction to go helps immensely.