Success! I think. Anyway, thanks to loyal readers for help and encouragement, and thanks also for the warnings. I'll be on my guard, but at this point I seem to have QuickBooks working as well as was ever likely for someone who (a) doesn't know what he's doing, and (2) just installed it one stressful day ago.

The big roadblock I ran into yesterday, it seems, happened because I hadn't registered the product or the company. I didn't know that wasn't automatic, because there were no warning screens or invitations that told me to register. In fact, as soon as I installed the program, I noticed at the bottom of the screen a little note that told me it was communicating with its own website.

Anyway, the first call was to the payroll department, to find out why I couldn't purchase their software. Unfortunately, I never got to speak to an actual person during that first call, because an automated voice kept telling me to input my phone number, and then it kept telling me that it didn't recognize the number and demanding that I enter it again. At some point during this tedium, I pushed the wrong button on my phone, so that by the time a real person came on the line, my end of the conversation was muted. I don't blame that person, whose voice wasn't exactly made for phone communication anyway, for hanging up on me.

When I called back and realized what I had to do so the new person could hear me, he asked me questions about registering that I couldn't answer. I think I realized before he did that I hadn't registered, so he told me how to do it. It was a couple of clicks, and... guess what... another phone call. To get a validation number to complete the registration.

So I called the new phone number and talked to Max, who asked me a few more questions (and a few of the same ones) before he could tell me what I already knew, that the product wasn't registered. Uh, yeah, Max, that was the reason I called. So thanks. He gave me a registration number first, and then (after a wait of about fifteen minutes) the validation number. I made sure to input it while he was still on the line, but it seemed to have worked. I said goodbye to Max and moved on.

The next time I tried to add the payroll service, everything was working fine, or so it seemed. Naturally, I couldn't just leave it at that. I took a quick break, then proceeded to the next step, setting up the payroll itself. I didn't know how long it would take, and I didn't want to be working all night again, but I lack the will to chill when there's something to be done.

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Fortunately, we have only seven current employees, so it wasn't hard to input all their data in one session. One long session, though: I was still working as night fell and the room grew dark and the only light was from the computer screen. But we're ready, I think. I guess I'll know for sure next week, when I have to run an actual payroll. Maybe I can even get the time cards early enough to get a head start, just in case something goes wrong. (Yeah, no. That probably won't happen.)