See:

• https://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Changing%20the%20e-mail%20program%20used%20by%20Firefox

Thanks for the reply, however, that does not solve it. I had already tried those directions, but when I go to the panel at tools>options>applications>mailto , gmail etc. are NOT offered as options in the pulldown menu.

Strange, try this

• http://www.zedlan.com/gmail_by_default_xp.php

Thank you, Swarnava, for the help. I am going to pause and think about this for a little --- I may just have to live with the inconvenience, rather than the security risk of installing an unknown program... but your help is very much appreciate it.

It is indeed strange, because it used to work fine in previous versions of Firefox (or perhaps something external from Firefox changed...)

GmailByDefault XP is a free utility for Windows XP that will set your Windows default mail client for mailto links to Google Gmail.

It does NOT install any software code on your PC - it simply tells Windows that you want to use your default web browser to open Gmail to compose new messages when clicking on a mailto link, and is easy to "uninstall".