Icons dissapear

Got a question I hope someone can help me with. I open a program like Word and then want to minimize it and open another program. Now when I want to reaccess Word I should have a box in the lower toolbar that I can go to and just click, but I have nothing there. It stays blank. I can access my programs through the ALT/TAB buttons so I know they are open, but no icons in the toolbar. Is there a setting I have wrong or some other way to fix this? Please help me if you can. Thanks....
 
check the taskbar/start menu settings and make sure u dont have autohide taskbar checked....if u do uncheck it...either way i'm sure ur problem is in these settings
 
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