Typically speaking, most users get help fairly quickly on this forum, depending on the issue.

Have you attempted any of the steps from the Recover lost or missing Bookmarks documentation to recover your lost bookmarks and other information?

Sorry--I am pretty frustrated. At this point I am just trying to restore my computer to where it was 2 hours ago. Not having any luck with that either. The new Firefox that I downloaded asks me to sign in--as far as I know I have never had an account. So if I say I don't know my password it says I may lose my bookmarks etc by resetting my password ==so either way I lose my bookmarks it looks like.

As far as using the recover lost or missing bookmarks--they were in my old Firefox --no way to import them without a password. REset password= lose bookmarks.

I just wanted to be able to use Firefox without it delaying starting because each time it was "updating" sometimes for about 5 minutes

The sign in box is for a Firefox Account. This is used for the Firefox Sync feature. However, you can dismiss the sign in page if you don't use Firefox Sync (the service that syncs bookmarks and settings between multiple devices).

If you aren't able to login, it's quite possible that you don't even have an account. The information about creating a Firefox Account appears each time you update because it's a feature that some people may be interesting in and didn't know about. But it's entirely optional.

As for getting your information, there are a few things you can check.

Firstly, the easiest thing to check is whether you can simply restore a backup of your bookmarks. The steps for doing that are listed if you click here.

In some strange instances, Firefox has also refreshed itself during the update process. If this is the case, you will see an "Old Firefox Data" folder on your desktop. If you see that, you can recover your data from that folder.

If you don't, enter about:profiles in the Firefox address bar and make note of how many Firefox profiles you have listed. Generally, users will only have one. If you have multiple listed, it's possible that Firefox had an error when updating and may have accidentally created a fresh profile for you. If you have more than one listed, let us know because the information will likely be in the other profile and we can tell you how to transfer it over.

If you only have one profile listed, press the Windows key + R on your keyboard, type %appdata%\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles and press Ok. This is the folder that Firefox profile data is stored in. In some cases, Firefox may have created a second profile for you because it lost track of where your old profile is. If this is the case, you will see multiple folders, but they may not be listed in the about:profiles page. If you have multiple folders, we can likely help you to restore your information.

Sorry if it's a lot to go through, but I'm just trying to cover the most common causes of an issue like this so that you can resolve your issue quickly and get back to browsing.

Hope this helps.

Thanks Wesely for trying to help. I marked this as it didn't resolve my issue because I didn't want our conversation to be closed out in case this doesn't work for me. I am going to have to give it up for tonight--work tomorrow. But I will try again tomorrow and let you know. I do appreciate your help. I thought maybe if I could get my old version back==I could create an account from it then download the new version and be able to keep my bookmarks and import them. I am just not good with this sort of thing. Thanks again for your help. I will follow your instructions and see if I can get it to work for me. Sandy

If you're using Windows, you could activate the System Restore Point option. Learn more about it before you activate it. If you had your bookmarks in your last Restore point, activating it would bring them back. Of course backup any valuable data. Sorry it came to this, I recently lost my bookmarks as well but it was my fault. I remembered I made a Firefox account so I recovered some of them. From now on, please make a Firefox account which will save your bookmarks on the server and enable you to have access to them from wherever you login through Firefox. Exporting your bookmarks and saving it on your pc, online storage or USB is another good option. Good luck!