I am running XP Pro SP2, on a P4.
I have the up-to-date Norton Antivirus and Firewall.
I am connected to the internet through my universities Network which also
has some very expensive Antivirus Software and Firewalls. I have run a full
scan of my computer using Norton and come up with no viruses.
I have now found that no programs have shortcut keys attributed to them.
These poblems seem to occur most often when I'm playing games, but
occasionally in other circumstances...

The Problem: The Calculator tool frequently opens by itself, less
frequently, windows media player (10) opens by itself, also (I have only
noticed this when playng games) my PC has a tendancy to shut down all of its
own accord, least frequently MSN Messenger opens by itself (The last may be
insignificant as Messenger seems to obey its own special rules, it is
supposed to open and log on by itself on startup, sometimes it attempts
neither, other times it logs on and then off straight away)

I would deduce that I have no viruses. The problem seems particularly
aggravated by gaming, but it was there before I loaded any games, and I
cannot attribute it to the installation of any particular program. There are
no shortcut keys attributed to the said applications.

The only other explanation I have though of is that I have pressed the
windows key to bring up the start menu in the background f my game and then
other key presses from there have resulted in the running of an application.
This however doesn't explain how things start when I'm not gaming, as I
would see the start menu appear.

Please HELP. By all means tell me how to turn the 'windows' key off (if
possible) and I will see if that is an improvement, but it cannot be the
whole of my problem. Help me please.