Well went in in safe mode. Under administrator options or tools, I selected Nero burning and made that available to all users. That makes no difference when I go back to normal mode. Still unable to create a pdf from Word, even tried a different pdf creator, which did not work either, but at least did not lock up everything.
I think I know what I will be doing Saturday.
Thanks nonetheless to Jephree and townsbg for suggestions. I have to hope that this is a one off event.
Another bit of grasping at straws, I have heard that there is a finite number of times you can install Windows before you need to get permission or something from Microsoft. Could that be the case here?