Well...although all of the help and suggestions provided by others here in the forums did not solve the problem I was having with Avast, everybody's efforts are much appreciated. However...for reasons unknown, Avast just finally auto-updated itself!
Well... I had a really stubborn box here. The solution to this was to not just uninstall, but also
install Avast in safe mode. Worked w/o any issues after that. (Dunno whether it can be a recommended solution, but worth a try.)
