Networking Illiterate- can't find wireless connection

Okay, I'm not very educated about laptops or wireless networks. I have two desktop computers in my home that both connect to the internet via a Microsoft wireless router. My daughter recently brought home a laptop from my mothers house (Dell Inspiron 5100) that is used in their home on a wireless router system. However here it won't detect any wireless networks. The MS help pages say to go to the Network Connections and click on the icon that shows my wireless connection, then click view available networks. There is no "view available networks" icon listed. I've tried running all the wizards for the wireless network and internet settings.

From all of my internet searching on this (4 frustrating hours) it seems as if something is wrong with the internet connection settings. Under Network Connetions there only shows 2 LAN connections. On is a 1394 connection, that says its connected. The other is says "Local Area Connection 2 Network cable unplugged Broadcom 440x 10/100 integrat.." and nothing else. On Microsoft's help pages it seems there should be a third icon for the wireless connection that may have something to do with an icon on the desktop entitled "Netgear WG111v3"

Help, my daughter wants to be able to do her homework from her room...

 

the netgear icon is the software for the netgear WG111v3 wireless usb adapter youll need to connect to a wireless network. did she bring the adapter home?

http://kbserver.netgear.com/products/wg111v3.asp

 

I guess that's the problem, I assumed that it had an internal wireless card like most newer laptops. I will call mom and she if she has some type of adapter for it. Thanks! Can't believe I pulled my hair out for hours and there IS no wireless connection to try to find. Ugh.

thanks again!