I don't suppose this is one of those you-would-phone-MS-and-shake-your-fist-as-an-honest-paying-customer-but-it-would-be-a-bit-embarrassing-if-they-called-your-bluff scenarios?
Thanks all for sympathy & ideas. I managed to sort it out - eff knows how - & updated IE, but it hasn't made a blind difference to Ethan, who remains vanished, at least to me.
"We all have flaws, and mine is being wicked." James Thurber, The Thirteen Clocks 1951