Well that's hilarious! I wasn't using a custom Start button. All I did just now was turn the option for custom Start button on and the Start button showed up. I wonder if that's required for left vertical taskbar. Hmmm... But now I want to make a custom start button of like Pikachu or Baby Yoda or something. Thank you! I'm testing this on my home PC but hoping I can get a security exception to install it at work. Thanks for the suggestion!
Strange that if I uncenter the taskbar icons, they do overlap with the custom Start button (align right to the top and overlay the icon) and they did that before as well when it broke. It's like they're aligned to overlap where the Start button is supposed to be. It wasn't like that when I first installed it last night but at least I can visibly see the Start button now. I don't mind the icons having to be centered especially since I can resize the height to fit more.
Thanks again!