Panel grayed out and inaccessible

Recently I decided to leave the cutting edge and downgraded from Plasma 5.6 and QT 5.6 back to the standard 5.5 from the main update repository. This solved a host of problems I had been having, but now I have a new one. My lovingly configured panel at the bottom of my screen is grayed out and can’t be accessed. It looks like something translucent is overlaying it. It would be functional in that I can see apps added to the taskmanager when I open them and the number of emails on the kmail icon changes when I receive new emails, etc. Only I can’t access it – clicking on it doesn’t do anything. When plasma first comes up it seems to open normally (ungrayed) but almost immediately it looks like something is overlaying it. I’d abandon it and start anew, but I can’t delete it either. At one point in the process of downgrading, I tried to create a new panel, but that one now appears grayed out at the top of the screen. Now that I seem to have things stable, I was able to create a new panel that works properly, but who needs a screen with three panels, two of which don’t work.

By the way, the original panel was created under the stock version of KDE in 13.2, so it isn’t something about the panel itself.

Is there something I can do to access my old panel?

Thanks for any help. I really appreciate it.