multiple panels showing up

oops.... I think I may have played with a setting somewhere that I shouldn't have
Somehow I've lost the original gnome menu and now I have one that says Applications & Places. Also, every time I reboot or restart X I'm getting one additional panel added to the top of the screen AND the bottom of the screen! Also, the applets that go in the panel at the top are increasing numbers each time I reboot or restart X! HELP!!! I don't know what I did ... but I want back my original setup!!!

Thanks for your time and efforts!

I should mention, that I just got done installing the nvidia driver as well ... don't know if that had anything to do with it or not?