Programs on Windows XP (Home) Start menu deleted from computer

[matt2500]

I'm trying to figure out a real head-scratcher here. My mom called me to come look at her computer, as several programs (Freecell, Solitaire, the Windows calculator) have apparently vanished from her machine.

All were in the 'recently used programs' part of the Start Menu (not the permanently pinned-to-the-menu ones, just files that had recently been opened and appeared on the list).

I thought she had simply accidently removed them from the Start menu, but no, these executable files are nuked from the machine. A search for calc.exe, or sol.exe, comes up completely blank.

My next thought was some type of virus/malware nuked (or even renamed) these files, so I just finished a sweep of her computer with a just-updated version of AVG Pro 7.5, but it found nothing more malicious than a couple of tracking cookies.

Has anyone seen anything like this before?

Thanks.

eta - Actually, she's running Windows ME; I just assumed it was XP Home.