Update:
I have tried several of the suggestions and no joy as of yet. I just now finished downloading and creating a USB install using the "media creation tool" that several of you suggested. which I will try on my laptop tomorrow. If that doesn't do the job I will just forget about it and use it on Linux Ubuntu as that works a whole lot faster than Windows 7 does anyway. I have the Linux installed on a USB hard drive that I boot to instead of Windows. Sure has come in handy lately! By the way, I had to use my desktop Win10 computer to create the USB stick. The laptop froze at 50% doing that.
I'll post another update when I finish trying the USB install as suggested by several of you. Thanks for all the help!:)
Barney