Need to verify PSE 13 upgrade installed correctly

Hi and thanks in advance for any help.

Photo Shop Elements 13 3rd party filter issues after upgrade AND question about possible installation issues after upgrading from PSE 7.

Problem: I have not been able to get any of my 3rd party 8bf filters to work or even show up in the filter menu since upgrading from PSE 7 to PSE 13.

Running Windows 7 Pro 64 bit on an upgraded HP M7664x desktop. FWIW I have 8 GB RAM, ATI Radeon 4850 GPU, upgraded HDs, PSU and CPU but doubt details are relevant.

I am currently troubleshooting a problem with no 3rd party 8bf  filters/plugins showing up in the filter menu since the upgrade and reinstalling the filters. After a lot of research online in forums I found several threads where others had the same problem after upgrading to PSE 13. Forum responders indicated  PSE 13 was 64 bit and would not load or recognize 32 bit filters.  After reading that II downloaded all the 64 bit versions of my favorite 3rd party filters that I could find but even 64 bit filter versions will not show up in the filter menu. I just now noticed that PSE 13 is installed under the regular Programs / Files folder and not under the Program / Files (x86)  where my other 64 bit programs are installed. Now I am wondering if PSE 13 is really 64 bit, didn't install quite right or I got some wrong information.

My research did turn up an application called Alpha Plugins Launch Box which has a optional Alpha Plugins Bridge included for purchase which claims the "Bridge" works as a filter converter within the PS Filter folder to allow older 32 bit 8bf filters to work in various PS 64 bit programs. I upgraded from PSE 7 to PSE 13 a while back and haven't had much free time to dig into it but I was able to get 3rd party plugins to show up and work with PSE 7.  My main editor so far has been Irfanview for it's simplicity and ability to use 8bf filters. The lack of ability to use layers in Irfanview has me wanting to take another stab at tackling the PS learning curve (somehow layering is amazingly simple in PS Touch on my iPad). My lack of ability to use 3rd party .8bf filters with PSE 13 has pretty much been a deal killer so far.

I purchased and installed the Alpha Launch Box including installing the optional Alpha Plugins Bridge per their instructions and successfully registered it.  Alpha Plugins 32 Bit Bridge does show up in the filter menu however it does not recognize or bring up any of my 3rd Party plugins (to avoid additional repetition the only plugins I have used so far are the .8bf filters).  While troubleshooting this issue in preparation to contact them for support I noticed something that might indicate PSE 13 did not install correctly. In the (C:) Programs Data / Adobe / PSE folder there are subfolders for both PSE 7 and PSE 13. The Editor part of program shows up only under the PSE 7 subfolder however Locale and Creations subfolders appear under both version sub folders of the PSE Program Data folder.

Under the actual programs folder  (C:) Programs / Adobe / PSE only the PSE 13 program folder shows up along with the usual files including PhotoshopElementsEditor.exe.  Since the PSE 7 reference is only under the Programs Data folder I'm not sure if it is a non issue or an indication that PSE 7 has some left over code or registry info that is conflicting with the PSE 13 program upgrade?  Other than not being able to get any 3rd party plugins to show up; PSE 13 seems to run fine and I haven't noticed any significant menu or user interface differences in the user interface from PSE 7 (or I just didn't remember PSE 7 well enough to notice).

Question 1:  Could the PSE 7 Editor file showing up in a Program Data subfolder for PSE (but only under the Program Data folder) possibly indicate a potential conflict installation issue with PSE 13 ?

Question 2: Are all versions of PSE 13 64 bit?  If so should my PSE 13 program have been installed under Program / Files (x86)

Question 3: Does anyone have experience with solving something similar or have other ideas on why I can't get third party filters to work after upgrading to PSE 13?

I do get an PC Error message that appears behind the PSE editor window about not the computer not being able to find a certain Alpha Launch Box .ini file and a manual search for it did not turn anything up that I will contact Alpha Plugins support but since I couldn't get any 3rd party 64 bit filters to work either I'm suspicious that there could be some kind of install error or conflict with my upgrade to PSE 13.

Please accept my apologies in advance if my post seems excessively redundant or I over complicated it.  I struggle with some pretty bad brain fog issues and seem to have lost the ability to condense my thought succinctly without leaving out important details.