With the greatest respect, I am not a total idiot and I do know when a code is entered correctly or not as I seem to recall already having done an automatic upgrade very soon after installing the product. The original version was 3.4.2, the code was entered in the correct place for both the component and the VM extension and it showed the correct registration details.
When I clicked on upgrade and it did it automatically, it then showed me the link code that you get in the free edition. After I did as you suggested and did a manual install it disappeared, so my thoughts are that it either is not recognizing the code that was entered and loaded the free version by default, or it is simply loading the free version regardless. Either way, the issue is on your end of things, not mine.
Other than this issue, I am very happy with the product overall.