Laptop Black Screen

Hello!

So, I have a Gateway, windows xp, intel centrino duo, model E- 265M

I'm not entirely sure that's completely relevant as I think I recall this happening to various types of laptops I've used in the past, but...

I'm a very forgetful person, and sometimes I get so engrossed in things that I forget to check my battery. So the scenario is, it's powering down since it's running out of battery, I plug it in to try and save it but too late- the screen's black.

Then it stays black, even though it has power supply, and nothing I press or do aside from shutting it down brings it back, in which I lose all of my progress and placement doing this and I'm sure it fries the system out that way.

I could try waiting till it fully runs out and just shuts down, but... I feel like there's risk there, and I don't want to do that in the instance there's a safer way to handle this.

Could someone tell me the best advice on how to handle this?

Thank you!