Fresh install of Linux Lite shows stock XFCE desktop

[Moltke]

OK I would like to THANK all of you who replied with helpful tips. Here's the rundown of what I did:

1. downloaded iso from linuxliteos.com website
2. checked the md5sum and it is correct
3. created usb stick with the iso
4. ran the live system - loved it - decided to install it
5. Ran the default installer from the live iso and at partitions level (which I have done hundreds of times before so I thought I had got it, always choose "Something else" and attach my home dir to /home, and format /) it said I needed an EFI partition, but there were none to choose from the available options. This gave me a head scratch (or two) and after a while I rebooted, disabled UEFI, booted again and proceeded with the installation of Linux Lite. Again at partitions level it said I needed a min 2MB boot partition (?? I never ever had to do that with other distros) so I created it. I unchecked "download updates during installation" and only checked "install third party software".
6. There are no other operating systems on this laptop. Before I had Fedora and then Linux Mint installed here, no problems whatsoever. I am attaching a sys report below.
7. Everything seemed to install without any problems. First clean boot and I see a stock XFCE desktop... Nooooooooo!  :019:

My partitions are the following:
https://ibb.co/yPcRh7R

My only guess is that something went wrong at the partitions level, but I have no clue, really. I am willing to reinstall, I guess my emotions were running high in my first post (sorry). Could you please help me figure out what went wrong and how I could fix it. THANK YOU so much for your effort, I really appreciate it.

I think your best bet is reinstalling to make sure everything works as expected. Boot in UEFI mode and when asked for an efi partition just create one with 100mb in size, and the mountpoint should be /boot/efi. Don't mount your /home but let the installer create one for you. You can always migrate your old home to the new one, just avoid those files referring to the desktop and just copy your personal settings such as email accounts, .mozilla, .bashrc, and from .local just copy those folders and files referring to your apps but not the desktop; don't copy the whole directory over your new home.

[Valtam]

UEFI install guide in the Help Manual?