Ok. Thanks for all the advice. I was going to do some cleaning on her today (didn't happen. The boyfriend stole me) but I laid her gently on her side and was cleaning out the underside briefly. There is a cable that goes from inside the machine to the electrical plug on the rich side of the machine. I'm guessing it was once rubber or something like that. It's white and powdery and kind of flakey. I'm afraid this means I will need to rewire her or something. (something I don't think I can do!
) I plug her in and she runs. The other cables look fine. A little feathery in the fabric department but she's 50 some years old, so I figured that's to be expected. Any advice? I took some pics but need to be home to download them to the computer. But maybe someone knows just by description? Help?