Stuck on startup screen on laptop

[Kevinrose1]

Is how far I got after starting up the laptop is this blue screen

[WAWood]

@Kevinrose1 

From what I could locate, this is a really, really OLD laptop -- one that came with Windows XP -- and most likely, if you have not changed the original hard drive, that has died.

To check the drive you have to follow these steps:
1) Press Esc key repeatedly, several times a second, while rebooting the laptop. Do NOT hold the key down, just press it over and over.
2) Eventually, you will see an HP Startup Menu -- that will look similar to the image below ...

3) press the Function key for testing the hard drive (usually F2) and let it run.