Taskbar appearance and Location

In Vista Home Premium, my taskbar appears as 1 wide grey column on the left side of the screen instead of the thin horizontal strip accross the bottom. All efforts have failed to revise the taskbar to it's traditional shape. Help Please

Have you right clicked on the Taskbar, removed the check mark from "Lock the Taskbar", and then grabbed an empty place on your Taskbar with your mouse and dragged it to the bottom of the screen?