Does Not Get Any Worse Than This

" I don't have the original disc or "box" so they are giving me all kinds of grief."

If you can't give them any proof of purchase then I don't think it's unreasonable for them to recommend purchasing a new version. No offense intended but I can't help compare this to returning to a store 2 months later but without your receipt and then demanding that they replace your product because it's broken. How are they going to determine that you actually bought it from them?

Still, you obviously have an Adobe account (considering your post) and if you bought it from Adobe itself I can't help wonder what this URL shows you: https://account.adobe.com/products

You should be able to find your serial numbers there for any product bought from Adobe (or so I think).

"Then, as a final straw, they say this is a "retired" product and will no longer give me any assistance.  Are you kidding?  These people have lost their way."

You could of course also have done a little more research before purchasing the software and making assumptions about the warranty period. It's not as if Adobe makes a secret out of their terms of usage, you might be especially interested in item 9: "Disclaimers of Warranties". Each to their own but I actually read all of that before I upgraded to PSE 2021 so that I knew what I got myself into.

In the mean time I see that MacOS also got mentioned a few times and well, I don't think you can (nor should) blame Adobe for all the idiocy Apple sometimes pulls with their OS upgrades. Because trust me: it's not just Adobe here! When they updated to Catalina it caused huge problems for the audio community because...  Ableton Live, Reason, Komplete, Reaper; all major DAW's ("Digital Audio Workstations") and all companies behind them strongly recommended: "Don't upgrade to Catalina just yet!". btw: don't take my word on this, there's plenty information online to back up my claim.

In fact, I'd argue that because of stunts like the above companies like Adobe have little choice to restrict their warranty terms; otherwise you could be forced to have your developers apply additions to (almost) every version of your software (which will dramatically increase costs) and only because an OS developer wasn't professional (or capable?) enough to provide decent backwards compatibility.

(not meant to rub things in but did you know that Windows 10 can actually run software from Windows v1?  I actually tried this.. Heck, it's because of this why I also rely on FreeBSD vs. Linux; the latter often has the same nasty issues with being backwards compatbile.).

Now, please note... I can understand your frustration and I'm honestly not disagreeing on that with you, this is frustrating! But I also think you're blaming the wrong company here, and I base that on everything I mentioned (and experienced) above.

(it's not my intention to start a whole discussion so I'm leaving it here, if you do wish to discuss then feel free to drop me a personal message and I'd be happy to exchange opinions and ideas).

What do you mean not working on iOS ? elements runs only on Windows or macOS.  So i guess that you mean macOS. Indeed only versions from elements 2020 and higher will run on macOS Catalina (and Big Sur later today i think).

Tht info has been out for over a year now. And nope, adobe wil not update the 2018 or 2019 versions of elements to run under Catalina or Big Sur. Indeed, never gonna happen. 

If you want to run elements under Catalina you have to have version 2020 or higher. 

Indeed that is the terrible (lack of) support from Adobe for the elements software. Just a maximum of 1 year support (with almost no updates in that year). It has to be the worst supported software on the planet. 

Personally i don't advice this software to anyone anymore. There is cheaper software that does the same with much longer and better software support 

Yeah, it can be pretty irritating. i guess that elements has one of the WORST sopport of software from large companies on the world. After a year you are pretty much on your own. 

did you buy your 2018 version directly from adobe under your adobe account ? If you did that, you can sign in to your adobe account and at "orders" there should be your 2018 version with licence number. I don't know if this is also listed there is you only registered that software after buying it somewhere else. But that is the first place you should look. 

You will need your serial number, too:

https://helpx.adobe.com/x-productkb/global/find-your-serial-number.html

Hi

Since your question is about Photoshop Elements, I have moved this from the Photoshop forum where you posted to PS Elements.

No guarantee, but you can try ProDesign Tools:

https://prodesigntools.com/photoshop-elements-2018-direct-download-links-premiere.html

~ Jane