Windows 7: Unable to set file associations for MS Office 2007

I know how to set file associations, but it does not work. I had MS Office 2003 and the associations worked fine. I ungraded to MS Office 2007 and they had not worked since then. The associations menu shows .doc and .xls files are associated with MS Office 97-2003. When I click to open a .doc or .xls file, I get a failure msg saying "there was a problem with this file"



If I start Word or Excel, I can then open the file with no problem. I have created files in both Office 03 and 07. But I cannot click on a file and have the program open to read it.

I know the path to the 07 Excel and Winword EXE programs. After updating the Associations menu to the 07 programs, and clicking on file, the failure msg says this is not a legitimate Wnin32 file.

This should not ordinarily be a big problem, but it is! I have a small business and get .xls and .doc files all day long. It's huge problem for me. I have to save the file from email, then open the program, then find the file in the download folder to finally open the file.