More Trouble with Word

I previously posted a question related to my inability to open Word documents from the My Recent Documents menu. I’m running XP Student Teacher and Office 2003. All program associations are fine. My McAfee A/V doesn’t detect any spyware. Most frustrating is that this (my inability to open anything from My Recent Documents) is happening sporadically. In addition, I cannot open Word attachments that come with emails. Both types of problems seem to happen after I leave the computer for a while or after I close the lid (I’m using a laptop). So is it the fact that my system hibernates?? This was not an issue just a few weeks ago on the same laptop, so I’m not sure what’s causing the problem now.