Internet not working on laptop

Hello,
I am trying to fix a friend's HP Pavilion dv6000 laptop with Windows XP. When I open internet explorer or safari, it says the webpage cannot be displayed. This is what has happend so far:

Everything was working fine, then one day last week the above error showed up everytime I opened the internet. However, if I opened my email with Outlook and clicked on a hyperlink within an email, it would pull up the webpage just fine. I upgraded to IE 8 and then the internet seemed to work fine again and I didn't have to access it by clicking on an email's link.

A couple days later, though, I started receiving the same "webpage cannot be displayed" error and now cannot get a link in an email to work either. The wireless switch on the front of the computer is glowing orange and no matter which way I push the switch, it stays orange. I cannot get it to view available wireless connections, either. I tried a system restore = didn't fix the problem. Tried a driver recovery of "Broadcom 802.11b, 802.11g, 802.11ag Network Adapters Driver" = didn't fix the problem.

I ran the CMD and ipconfig and it says "ether net adapter Local Area Conection: Media state...media disconnected". I'm not a computer expert, but I was thinking it shouldn't say "media disconnected"? I don't know how to "connect" it then.