Oh, wow. Thank you so much for going through the trouble of giving such detailed and constructive input. This looks ‘way over my head. I thought I could just create the thumb drive and navigate to it to open it. Tune in tomorrow, lol!
“create the thumb drive and navigate to it to open it.”
Well the problem is twofold. First computer manufacturers always have the boot order in the BIOS as local LAN network-hard drive-CD/DVD-USB.
When the order should come from the factory as USB-CD/DVD-then hard drive or LAN. That way it looks for a bootable USB or CD first before it goes on to the hard drive.
I don’t know why they have always done that, but it sucks and makes this more complicated than it needs to be. But that is not the fault of Linux, that is the machine. and actually if you had to boot up in a windows repair/recovery USB stick or DVD you would have to also reset the boot order also. So it is nice to know how on your machine anyhow.
Second, you are starting up from when you turn the power on into a whole different Operating System. It has to power up in this alternative OS, An OS cannot be switched at will after one is already loaded up, the machine has to be told to power up into the optional OS.
Just follow it step by step. If you give it a shot please let me know. You are welcome to PM me anytime if you like. :)