As per my initial post, the only Java on my computer was the Azul version so the Java.com Removal tool was not required as no Java.com product had ever been installed.
The InstallTest tool was great; it identified that the issue was with my Java and the ¡®fix¡¯ as I described was to remove my original version and then install a more recent version. The mystery remains though, as why the earlier version worked initially but then apparently became corrupted¡(??) Anyway, the latest version that I installed [zulu17.52.17-ca-jdk17.0.12-win_x64] corrected whatever had gone awry.
James S. Brown