Dakine,
I finally got something to work, but it was accidental. After doing all the above and failing (see my last post), I re-installed the CC version of PS (with the 2014 version still on my computer, as was LR 5.5). That didn't fix the problem, so I just used CC and forgot about 2014. But soon I started getting notices from the Creative Cloud app telling me I needed to update PS CC. Didn't make a lot of sense given that 2014 is the latest version, butI eventually allowed CC to upgrade PS CC and bingo! everything began working as it's supposed to.
Now I'm stuck with an older version of PS (CC) on my computer but I'm not getting rid of it for fear of triggering the problem all over again.
I still suspect different versions of Camera Raw causes the problem, but given Adobe admits mistakes/problems about as willingly and as often as a politician, who knows if I'm right.
All I can say is, good luck.
EdB