Friend has a Win 98 machine. As of several days ago, the open windows tabs/buttons are missing from the task bar display. The quick-launch and status buttons are visible. I had her try a diskcheck but it BSOD'd when the check started. I'll have her run a spyware scanner and Dial-a-fix next time I see her, but I was hoping there would be an easy answer to the task bar issue. Thanks.
bump
Have a look at "Repairing Windows 98" at the link below.May be of help.
My local chemist had a similar problem which turned out to be malware related.His pc-cillin security had run out so I told him to try AVG which found 3 virii and the prob was fixed.