How to play 'full screen'(but not covering the task bar) in WMP?

How to play 'full screen'(but not covering the task bar) in WMP?
Win 7, monitor-21' 1920X1080 native, Nvidia card.
My videos used to play 'full screen'(but not covering the task bar)...the top of the video would go up to the top of my monitor, and the bottom of the video would go all the way down to the bottom of monitor(underneath the blue playing 'progress bar'), or other words, the blue 'progress bar would over lay the bottom of the video when the mouse is on it, and would disappear when the mouse is not on it.
But suddenly, my videos are playing in reduced size, there's a one inch black bar across the top,
and the bottom only goes to the blue playing 'progress bar'(the video doesn't go beneath as before).
So, I've lost an inch on the top, and an inch on the bottom or screen real estate. And, of course
the sides have larger black bars now, also.
Normally, I use the 'Fit video to player on resize', and 'Fit player to video', at 200%.
I've played with those settings, trying various combinations, nothing seems to reset my
playing size. I've verified that my monitor resolution hasn't changed, it's still 1920X1080.
When I used to do 'full screen'(covering the task bar), the blue 'progress bar' would disappear, but now the blue 'progress bar' is showing.
Did Microsoft push an update that makes so the progress bar is always visible, and reduces your
screen real estate?
Anyone know how to fix this? Is there a 'hidden setting' somewhere that I'm not aware of?
Thanks!

Thanks for the swift reply. My monitor is not the issue, as everything else displays as it used it. Only WMP is displaying videos in reduced size. My VLC player, and WMP Classic still plays as it used to.