Program compatibility, flash.ocx, player version 10.0

Question

Operating System: Windows Vista Home Premium SP2 32-bit
Processor: Intel(R) Pentium(R) Dual  CPU  T2330  @ 1.60GHz (2 CPUs), ~1.6GHz
Memory: 2038MB RAM
Graphics Card: Mobile Intel(R) 965 Express Chipset Family
Browser: Flock 2.5.6
Flash:  10.0.42.34
IE version : 7.0.6002.18005
(note, I refuse to upgrade to IE8, as the last time i did, it severely screwed with my computer and i needed to reformat the hard drive)
Ok, I am at my wit's end with this. I installed Yahoo messenger 10 after messenger 9 refused to work for me anymore (even after a fresh installation). But after a clean installation of yahoo messenger 10, i'm constantly getting the compatibility error "This program requires flash.ocx, which is no longer included in this version of windows". The yahoo website keeps coming up with responses such as "reinstall flash".
Due to various other issues with this version of flash player, I nearly have to uninstall (using the adobe uninstaller, mind you) and reinstall flash at least once a month, even if I don't need to upgrade.
I really am lost as to what to do now. I have tried uninstalling Y10 and reinstalling it, but the exact thing happens.
What am i missing

Answer 1

I have Vista64 and had a similar problem when using the student version  of Pro Engineer.  I've made all the effort I'm going to put into the problem and from now  on will just put up with the error messages since I'm getting basic functionality.    An option I might persue someday is to find out whether Pro Eng uses  the 32 bit or 64 bit IExplor software and if I can choose which.  Another thing I might do is to run older operating systems inside of emulators (Virtual Box works really well).   I am  also wondering if Adobe is still interested in developing a 64 bit  version of its players and whether that could solve the problem  eventually?  Of course its not fair for them to have to develop two versions but it would be nice. For me, the solution can wait.  Hope this info is useful  to somebody, and thanks for this forum!
The Pro Engineer seems to run just fine, and I think the error only occurs because Pro Engineer runs an Internet Explorer window under a tab sometimes.  Pro Engineer comes in 32-bit or 64-bit and I have the 64 bit.  I already had Flash 10 installed in IE and that worked fine outside of the program, however there is no flash support for the 64-bit version of IE.  That is probably why windows Vista says I need flash.ocx ; and that is a guess.
A blind guess I made attempting to fix the problem:
First, I have not tried registering shortcuts or renamed ocx files, because I  don't want to cause a problem with my (already working) flash players in  my mozilla and IE 32.  The whole system of Active X controls is too big  and mysterious for me to deal with, and I can wait for the  compatibility problems to just go away.  Hopefully we all can.  As  someone who has a 64bit laptop, I hope all of the 32bit 64bit windows  issues get settled soon.  For the most part they have already been  addressed.
After the error occurred I looked up info about flash.ocx including this forum (which I appreciate!)  I then closed the Pro Engineer program and went to c:\Windows\SysWoW64\Macromed\Flash and found a file called "Flash10h.ocx"    I created a shortcut to this file on the desktop, renamed it to 'flash.ocx' and copied the shortcut directly into the SysWow64 folder and also into the executables folder for proengineer.  When I ran Pro Engineer again and opened the browser I still got the same error messages, so nobody do that as its not just a matter of a missing file.  Its a missing Active X  component problem, which is a bit more complicated.