Word 2010 can't save

Well that's a weird problem I've been having for a couple of days. First, let me introduce where it all started.

So a couple of days ago I messed a bit with Word settings and found out that the defaults can be set by deleting the Normal.dot/Normal.dotm file under %appdata%/Microsoft/Templates. I did that.
However, then I noticed that after exiting Word I get this message (every single time):

If I click Save, nothing happens, Word window with no blank page and only toolbars are visible (then if I try exiting again, same message appears). If I click Don't Save, Word shuts down successfully, but after launching it again and exiting, same thing happens. And it doesn't seem that Word recreates the default Normal template in the Templates folder - there's no such file visible, even with hidden and protected files set to visible.

What is more, the dialog for Save/Save As... doesn't work. Clicking these buttons simply throws me back to the document.

Tried re-installing, repairing... Same.

None of these was something about my situation, but I found this page:
Troubleshoot problems that occur when you start or use Word 2010, 2007, or 2003
It seems that the "Delete the Word Data registry subkey " was the thing that I needed.

I know this is a very old thread but one of my users just encountered this problem (Save As or Open dialog boxes not appearing). This is one of the top results I got googling the issue so figured may as well post a solution to it.

I noticed that in this instance only MS Word was having the issue, and it was isolated to the user's profile as I could log in with my credentials on their PC and did not experience the issue.

In order to fix I ended up having to delete the user's profile (in Computer properties > advanced system settings > user profiles) and then have them log back in to build a fresh profile. This fixed the issue.