Earthlink2003 uninstall problem

5150 Inspiron, XP pro SP1.

I uninstalled Earthlink 2003 using add/remove programs. The uninstall appeared to go ok...after the system restart, EL2003 was no longer in the add/remove list, but the program was still on the computer as if nothing had changed? I tried to manually remove the file from programs, but it would not delete because "EAuthMgr.dll was in use by another program"?

There are several files in EL folder duplicate (2) type with 0 bytes which appeared after a messy update attempt on line by EL, but I don't know what significance that is to the uninstall problem.

I then tried to reinstall the program from disc. Tried both the old 2003 version, and the new 2004 disc version, but both stopped in mid install with the message "D:\windows\access\earthlink setup.msi returned 1635" What is a 1635?

I did a system restore and am back before the original 2003 uninstall. Any one know how I can get this darn program to uninstall. The register is so full of Earthlink references that a manual hunt peck and delete is beyond my level of expertise. The program works, but I am afraid it will start to snowball into a multitude of other problems and I need to get it out and do a clean install of EL2004.

I am using my old w98 PC with Norton System works to research this problem, and it has by far outperformed my XP experience as of now.

Would appreciate any help.