startup problem

Hi folks

I have a friend who asked me to take a look at their Win98 machine as it is
having problems booting up, having had problems installing a new piece of
hardware and subsequently cancelling the installation.

The PC boots the initial Win98 screen and the taskbar initially flashes into
the bottom of the screen but then the whole screen is left blank with
nothing but the clouds wallpaper remaining. ie. there are no icons or
taskbar visible. Nothing happens with any mouse clicks or keyboard types.
Pressing CTRL, ALT, DEL brings up the screen with CLOSE, SHUT DOWN, CANCEL,
but there are no programs in the box. The only option is to close down.

We don't have any of the original (now lost) disks or cds, therefore i am
unable to make a boot disk or anything.

Any suggestions?

Many thanks.