"Jason" wrote

| It would work if you selected MSEdge :-)
|
| Actually, it did not work! In the Win Settings panel, I was offered Edge,
| IE, Chrome, and FF and couldn't change any of them.

That kind of thing is almost tradition. When it was
only IE and Netscape, both would muck up Registry
settings trying to take over as default. Eventually
they started behaving better. But as others have said,
I wouldn't put anything past Google. I think of them like
the Crusaders: They'll kill you trying to convert you to
their operation, all the while muttering about never
being evil.

It sounds like you've fixed it. If you ever get to
where you can't fix it, you can do it by hand. The
default handlers for file extensions are in the Registry
under HKCR\.html, etc.

I actually like to have IE as default. I never use it online
and block it from going through the firewall, but it's quick
and handy for reading HTML files locally. That setup also
means that when I accidetnally click something that
tries to call home by starting up the default browser,
that attempt is automatically blocked because IE can't
go out.
I then use a combination of FF and Pale Moon as
browsers. I just don't click links in email or put Web
shortcuts on my desktop. I open the browser directly
and paste URLs if necessary.