Player Will Not Open

Hello all,

For some reason, the Player button no longer opens the Player when I click it.

Here is what I do:
Click Player button in Story View and from within a scene,
Button stays down for a sec or two, (see image 1)
Software "flashes," (see image 2)
Player never opens.
Cannot click in/operate the software without getting an error beep,
Have to press Esc to return back to being able to click in/operate the software.

I have tried these things to remedy:
Restarted my machine,
Upgraded my version to 3.85.31840.0,
Downgraded to two previous versions,
Tried opening Player with a new, blank project,
Tried it with an existing project,
huge project,
small project...

behavior is always the same.

Any ideas?

Thanks! :-)