Alternative methods for unpinning from Start?

That's for the Task Bar. Bree is right, it's all about that Database folder. I'm looking around to see what others have done with it.

spunk said:

Did you follow the path in post #5?

How is that path relevant to the issue at hand?

With the right search term, TileDataLayer, it was easy finding past discussion of this, such as here:
Removing dead icons from Start menu All Apps

It looks like the vedatamodel.edb file is the key. Removing that, either via another profile, or better, via a recovery environment, should reset Start.

I would have tried that, but didn't want to lose everything else in the menu. Instead, I mounted the latest Win10 ISO and installed that on top of what I had, which is basically doing an "upgrade" while remaining on the same version. Sometimes doing that can resolve weird issues like this, and fortunately, it did. Those two icons are gone.