Scotia,
good to hear the memory upgrade has sorted your problem.
Memory upgrades are by far the recommended and most cost effective way of upgrading an existing system.
Shell,
just note the free memory you have left after your PC has booted up and before you start using it. Then physically dump "free memory" and see how much memory you can grab back.
It will only free up memory that the system is not using, memory that was used to pre load programs that are not actually in use. You see alot of programs when first installed, set themselves to be preloaded at start up, assumming you will want to use them, MS Office for example. Now you can remove these programs from the boot up sequence if you want I [I always do]
But using Freemem will do the same job for you, either set it to "Auto dump" or do it physically yourself once the indicated memory has reached it's lowest. [that means it has finished pre loading programs, this can go many seconds after you see your Desktop]
read the help files, they explain your options, and dont worry no matter how much memory you try to dump, it will only dump what ain't being used, so don't threat not even Blondes or Celts can cock it up