Unable to open ¨My Documents¨ folder on IBM T41

Sold a friend a T41, he said he changed a setting on the laptop. He does not remember what setting or what he changed. Now he is not able to open the My Documents folder on the desktop. Error message says you do not have sufficient security permission to open this folder, or something to that affect.
He then set up a separate My Documents short cut folder which allows him to open the folder.
Strange issue.