It's all rather confusing!
Which Windows? Which version of IE?
Can you describe some differences in layout between Standard & Basic?
I'm using IE8 on XP, which is about as old as you can get these days, and running Standard mode, I think, all the time.
She can get to 'Standard'
How? I can only see drop-down Options offer choice between Basic & Accessible modes.
Even if I switch to Basic mode and see a diff layout, when I re-login it comes back to the same layout as I had before.
If I switch to Accessible then next time I login it says 'You are running Accessible, do you want to switch to Standard?'. I say 'yes' and the layout switches back to my normal one. That makes me believe I'm running Standard all the time.
1999: Freeserve 48K Dial-Up => 2005: Wanadoo 1 Meg BB => 2007: Orange 2 Meg BB => 2008: Orange 8 Meg LLU => 2010: Orange 16 Meg LLU => 2011: Orange 20 Meg WBC