Well, after attempting to zero in on the other service/s preventing W-Audio from starting, I gave up ans just re-enabled them all. That worked. All is back to normal, except for the other changes. One of which is that I now have a cool desktop, one of the high contrast ones. I suppose I could do the thing where you disable half of the services, see if it still works, then half of the remaining, etc till you get to a point where it doesn't, then you know it's in there somewhere. Don't know if it's worth all that trouble. Maybe I'll just do some research on what stuff you can safely disable, and do that. 
 
Thanks for the help everyone.

I'm putting "solved" because if other people encounter this problem, they'll learn from this thread to dig around "services." 

Anderton
I'm putting "solved" because if other people encounter this problem, they'll learn from this thread to dig around "services." 

Or conversely learn not to dig around in services!
"If it ain't broke.....  

I found a guide online and I ended up disabling about 20 services. Stuff like Bluetooth, Smart Card, Remote Desktop etc. I don't use any of that. Everything still working fine. Computer definitely starts up faster, runs better, maybe even quieter. Music working great, no clicks, pops, buzzes etc.

Great news Michael. I certainly found disabling Bluetooth to be a plus. I haven't had any issues with other services causing problems since windows 7. Prior to that I would disable most everything. Luck of the draw I guess!

Here's the link to the guide I used:    http://www.digitalcitizen.life/which-windows-services-are-safe-disable-when
I'm sure you could get away with a lot more. I also got this from the Windows Forum, about what services are necessary for Windows Audio Service:
http://www.blackviper.com/windows-services/windows-audio/   Scroll down to dependencies, check out the stuff in blue. For Windows 7, check the tab at the the top.