Thanks to Tomm and Adam!
I have got my iLiad back and everything is working, thanks to Adam's clear and easy instructions. It took a bit longer than a few seconds. I now have a lesser firmware version (2.10 I think) - I can no longer connect via wireless, so I am going to have to work a bit to get that back. But believe me, I am so happy to have my machine back, I am ready to do a bit of work to figure out what happened. Thanks guys!