ipod missing program

Hi,

I was given an ipod for xmas. I went to the apple site and downloaded. I also, somehow, ended up paying ~50.00 for some membership that I thought was necessary--watta I know?

I get 2 messages: 1 that says the itunes download encountered problems and needs to be reinstalled and the other says that it sees an ipod connected but that it is not recognized.

I went to the itunes trouble shooting site and it asks me to go to add/remove programs and remove 6 different things there--in a specific order--and reinstall. The "apple mobile support" program (the 4th thing of 6)is not loaded. I removed/reinstalled several times w/o solving the issue.

I spent many hours w/apple tech support--where they transferred me from on person to another and repeating the uninstall/reinstall process many times. They also confirmed that there should not have been a membership fee--I emailed the company and asked that they refund my money and cancel my membership. When this company emailed me back, they ignored the cancellation request and sent me directions for getting songs to my ipod (the problem I was having--w/o my mentioning it). This company had another link--when I scan it I get a warning!--possibly this membership/download caused an issue.
Since then, I tried reinstalling, again, and I watched the destination folder--the apple mobile support folder actually appears momentarily but the download goes thru a "rolling back action" (something I noticed and told apple tech support about) and it disappears.
What suggestions do you have for me?