Hmm, didnt work. This user is also not shown as ADMIN or MODERATOR (in the search) even though the user name shows on the forums in the moderator list as well as in the MODERATOR SETTINGS in the control panel.
But WOW, did your suggestions help in the solution:
It turns out there were 2 users under the same login name, same public name (Identical even to the upper and lower case letters), but each was a different member number, different access rights, different post count etc.
1 was the user I use daily and the other, it appears, I created many years ago as member #260. This unused user was the only one showing in searches through the admin panel when I search by login name. Since it was the same login name, the result was technically correct. My actual profile would not show in the results. And "my" profile wasnt being seen for admin privelages since this duplicate was somehow surfacing
I deleted this outdated user, which had zero posts and no activity, and then the other user was relisted with all permissions. The control panel did not accidentally delete BOTH users (it seems to delete by user number even though it shows you the NAME before it deletes)
So it appears that somehow a user with a matching user login/public name was in the member list. It took several years for this error to surface and cause glitches.
Works now.