Unwanted Desktop Menu

I tried to disable my desktop icons by clicking "Show Desktop Icons" in the desktop menu, and when I did my desktop background turned white and I got a vertical blue menu on the left side of my screen that has "Folder Tasks" "Other Places" and "Details" each with dropdown links to various tasks. When I clicked on "Show Desktop Icons" again, it returned my desktop icon but the horrid blue menu remains. I can't right click on it for any properties and I don't know what it is to be more specific in trying to find out how to disable it. Can anyone help me please??
Thanx,
Ron

 

A seemingly common problem. Copy the text below between the ----- and paste it into Notepad. Go to File, Save As..., and save it as "commontasks.vbs" (no quotes). Click on the resultant vbs file to execute the script.
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'Remove Common Task from Desktop
'© Doug Knox - 02/04/2002
'This code may be freely distributed/modified
'downloaded from www.dougknox.com

p1= "HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{00021400-0000-0000-C000-000000000046}\shellex\ExtShellFolderViews\{5984FFE0-28D4-11CF-AE66-08002B2E1262}\PersistMoniker "
p2= "file://%userappdata%\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Desktop.htt "

Set WshShell = WScript.CreateObject( "WScript.Shell ")
WshShell.RegWrite p1, p2, "REG_EXPAND_SZ "

X = MsgBox( "Log off/log on or Reboot for the change to take effect. ", 4096, "Finished ")

Set WshShell = Nothing

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OR
Download the same script and execute it (ignore virus warnings---this is a safe script):
http://www.dougknox.com/xp/scripts/xp_commontasks_desktop.vbs