windows favourites

[#1]

I have recently had to reformat my hard disc due to a crash. The 'shop' which did this for me saved all my stuff before wiping the disc--fine. he put it all into a folder which duly apeared on my desktop. Amongst the stuff was my Favourites.
I have put this folder (which contains all my favourite site OK) back into the Windows folder in the Local Disc. The favourite folder appears in the Windows list following all the $NtUninstallW etc files as I would expect but when I start up my Internet Explorer my Favourite folders and files do not appear. The fancy 'Star' is there Ok but when I click on this all I get is a folder ' Favourites Bar', folders called 'Microsoft Websites', 'Financial Links' and an item preceeded by a four point open star symbol followed by 'Member Centre'
I am not a computer geek. I have tried moving the Favourites folder around but still no Favourites items (which contains some several folders and about twenty or so individual items.
Any ideas on how I can get these to appear in my favourites list when I go into Internet Explorer which is 8 I think
Help please
Bob27

[#2]

It sounds as if you haven't imported the favourites. When you want to save favourites you need to click export and then IE saves them to your Documents folder or desktop in html format.
What you need to do to import them is:
Click Favourites
Click the drop down arrow next to Add to Favorites
Select Import
Click Browse and navigate to the folder which contains the favourites, select and the wizard will import them.
The icon for the favourites is the blue 'e' Internet Explorer one.
What I and many more do is to use Firefox browser. This has a small addon called Xmarks which stores all your bookmarks on a remote server. Every time you change them it is synchronized.
It is all secure as you have a password to login. You can access them from any computer too. Very good in situations like yours when the computer crashes.

[#3]

Many thanks, Poppy, that worked a treat.
Before my computer crashed I was using Windows XP Professional.
My 'shop' reloaded XP Professional but obviously used a later version than
my previous XP.
Mostly it works fine but there are some differences.

[#4]

Glad to be of help, and that it worked OK.
If you want to stick with IE, now you know how to export favourites, might be an idea just to back them up every so often on a USB flash drive or other external media, along with your other backups.
If you fancy giving Firefox/Xmarks a go, post back as loads of people on here use this in preference to Internet Explorer and will be able offer advice.
There are plenty of really useful addons which quickly become indispensable.