Windows 10: Win 10 Pro Search box gone wonky?!

I have not changed settings that I know or can point to anything I've done, but the search option in the bottom left on the task bar, out of the blue, is being stubborn. When I click in it to type the pop up portion disappears. I have tried several suggestions but they didn't seem to answer the issue. I'm talking about this search bar in the image. Might you have any clues? Thanks for reading this far. I don't use Cortana, never have and any changes to rid Cortana was done weeks ago. Nothing done new that would cause this issue.

:)

 

search box

Hi,

Thank you for posting your query on Microsoft Community.

I appreciate your interest in Windows 10.We sincerely regret for the inconvenience caused.

I suggest you to follow the below steps and check if are able to find search box.

• 
  Right click on the task bar.
  
• 
  Go to Cortana.
  
• 
  Click on show search box.
  

Now check if you are able to find search box.

Please let us know if you need further assistance.

Thank you.

 

Windows 10 Search box

Which instructions are you suggesting I missed? There is no search icon. Right clicking the taskbar shows no search option. The "small characters" or icons trick did nothing. The regedit thing:
Follow these steps to turn on the hidden search box:

• Open regedit
• Go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Search
• Inside the search key, create the new DWORD value named EnableSearchBox and set it to 1
• Restart your computer or simply Explorer Shell

Did not give me a search option that I can find.

So in at least MY version of windows 10 there is no search box I can find that will allow me to search my own computer to find possible misplaced files.

So what are the instructions?

 

Win 10 Search Box

In Win 7, searches are available for repeat by down-arrowing
the Search box to the Right pane of the particular file. In Win 10
I have to go up to the Ribbon for my list of searches. An exhaustive search on the web provides me with one answer. Can't be done on the
Home version of Win 10. I received a .bat file that's supposed to work miracles, but the
Registry entry for [Windows] Explorer that the .bat is supposed to fix
isn't there.

Can someone please help?