You don't say what OS you are using?
I would seriously look at these programs that are opening before avast (for me avast is one of the first to load, even before my firewall). In my opinion there is absolutely no need for MSN to run on boot, rather you start it when you want it. Look at these other programs and assess if they need to start on boot.
You could uninstall these programs, reboot and install again (perhaps that may alter the boot order), unless these programs are security related I would say avast should load first.
Welcome to the forums.