shrink taskbar (not icons) area

In w7 on this laptop, I've moved over the taskbar to the right. But the whole "panel" in which the icons are placed, remains if anything larger than if the taskbar is at the screen bottom. I understand & have shrunk the icons themselves in the taskbar. That's not the issue, nor the question. The question is: that funny clear/grey area holding the icons (i.e., the taskbar "panel ") seems unshrinkable. The two-way arrow appears when I put the pointer on the (left) border. But nothing happens, the panel itself does not shrink & takes up a lot of valuable screen space. Is there a way to shrink this down to just bigger than the icons (which are now very small themselves)? Thank you.

 

To make taskbar icons bigger right click on empty space in taskbar, select properties, uncheck 'use small icons' box.

The taskbar will be slighly wider at the side of the screen than if at the top/bottom but not by very much.
Rather than dragging the toolbar to a different position use the options available from the properties drop down menu (again right click in unused taskbar space).

Remember to lock the taskbar position when you are happy with it.

 

Thank you, Chris, however, "slightly wider" and "not very much" mean a lot different to you than me. It appears other than using "properties" which I already know about & use (as per making icons small, e.g.) you have no further advice on this for the actual panel, such as regedit?

 

Did you try this? Orb\All Control Panel Items\Display.

 

Sorry I misread your post.