XP User Account Administrator Rights

Help please! I've messed up my PC big time. Thought I'd look here for help before I reformat hard drive and start over.

When initially installing XP, I had created user accounts then later removed them. I've "lost" the administrator account. I'm not able to log in as administrator because all the passwords I've ever used do not work. Not even sure what user name to use. I also lost my Outlook, all my favorites, etc. Any way to get back to the way it was before I deleted the user accounts? I have tried Recovery Console and a few other things, most of which require signing on as administrator. When I shut down and reboot, computer hangs at Windows is signing on screen.

Any suggestions, comments, help...it would all be appreciated. Thanks!

 

Adminstrator Account Names

Forgive me for stating jumping to wrong conclusions, but there are two things that don't add up...on XP there is always an administrator account with that as a user name. If you have fast user switching turned on, but no user accounts, the only account available is the "Administrator" account. I assume you have tried that as a user name despite the fact that you claim "intermediate" computer experience?

 

Our definitions of "intermediate" differ perhaps. A little knowledge is sometimes dangerous, which I believe I proved in this instance. I tried many things to resolve the problem and believe I only made it worse. Now when I boot up, I sometimes have an administrator login box in the background on top of which there's a dialogue box stating that the password entered is incorrect. Or, when booting up, the PC hangs at the "Windows is starting up" screen. What initially happened was that I deleted user accounts I had created, after which I was not able to log in as administrator because of an incorrect password, however, I am using the one I set up (it's written down). I've done so many things to "fix" this, I believe it will be less painful and time-consuming to try to resolve it at this point. Thanks for your reply.