I love reporting good news - I tried a number of things, some of which I recall and some of which I don't, but after a hugely long wait (30 minutes) all of a sudden the little flashing led stopped flashing and the screen refreshed and the update started. So, after another ten minutes of that, then a reboot and a key cd, I'm up and running!!!! Yay!!!!

Now all I need to do is to procure a GB+Eire 2008.2 cd