Vista - service cannot accept control messages at this time

I am having a problem which has just started up until this morning. my laptop with vista, that came with my lenovo, worked fine. now, well its gone crazy. i will explain and hopefully someone will be able to help. i tried to update my anti virus (Symantec) when i was greeted with an error message " the service cannot accept control messages at this time " i tried ccleaner, same message. windows defender, same message. some programmes, worked fine. Control panel won't work. so i thought i would do a system restore, same message! i then started up in safe mode and system restore worked, so i went back a week thinking that would cure it. went back to normal mode, same thing!! although this time a couple of new error messages "host process for windows services stopped working and was closed" and "application layer gateway service stopped working and was closed". i cant use my anti virus as it needs updating and i cant update. i tried downloading a free anti virus and it wouldn't let me as I'm not the administrator, but i am! i tried the "repair your computer " option on my laptop, no luck, still the same. i can connect to Internet ok, but it does not download. sorry if that a bit long winded, but that's what has happened. I'm a novice at this so if anyone can point me in the right direction to solve this i would be most grateful