Notebook Audio

Hello, I have had my laptop for over a year and a half now and I have never had any issues with the audio until now. I'd say maybe two days ago, I had closed my laptop over whilst I went to do something and when I came back, it appeared to have restarted as if it had installed an update as evidenced by the "bong-bing" noise playing and the screen showing the HP logo before loading onto my home screen with the previously opened tabs being closed. I went to watch a YouTube video later and found that the volume was far too loud, so I pressed the 'f6' key to turn it down, only to find that it was only at 4% volume. I turned the volume completely down and adjusted the audio slider on the YouTube video so that it was barely playing and it sounded normal once I  put my device audio back up (normal being, I would have my device audio on 30 and the YouTube slider at full previously and it would sound as loud as it does on 2% device audio and a tiny bit on the YouTube slider now). I restarted my laptop a few times hoping it would fix it but it still hasn't. I'm not tech-savvy by any means but I muddled though the various troubleshooting options on the HP Support Assistant app before continuing to muddle through the support options on the HP Support Website's Online Chat (not with a person). None of the solutions made any difference and from a brief glance, it doesn't seem like this issue is well documented. I apologize for the length of my ramblings but I'd truly appreciate any help or assistance that could be offered.