HELP!!! Clean Install of XP on Dell Inspiron 6400 - everything fails

Hi, I'm in need of serious help so I would really greatful if I could get some advice on this.

Today, my sole aim was to reinstall windows XP (clean) since I couldnt restore factory settings seeing as I bought a new hard drive recently. I was inexperienced so I actually repaired the OS by mistake, so Windows XP service pack 2 installed.

I tried to log in after the repair but a message came up asking me to verify or activate windows - fair play. But all that would appear was my background - no start menu, no shortcuts - nothing. I restarted about 5 times - nothing.

I looked up possible solutions and apparently the problem lies with internet explorer. Advice from a website told me to download some hotfix patch and internet explorer 8 - which i did, then install it in safe mode. I installed the patch ok, but IE8 didnt install because it needs updates from internet which i cant access in safe mode. I tried to install IE6 as it is more straight forward, but I couldnt since internet explorer 8 was already installed - i tried to delete it in "add/remove programs" but it wasnt there.

Next step was to clean install using the XP disc. I tried to delete the partition where the XP was installed, but it wouldnt let me because it had files that were needed for setup. The only other way would be to format my hard drive (using my computer>file>format which I tried and failed to do in safe mode. It wouldnt let me do it because i had to close programs that were using it, which i did do.

Please if you can help me, I would really really appreciate it.