How can I get Audacity to work with Vista 64-bit?? I need to be able to edit audio.?

I tried to read a .wma file to export to .mp3. I got an error message that said, "...due to patent restrictions, Audacity cannot read this file. Please convert it to MP3" Patent restrictions?! This is a file that I made today! And, I cannot open my .mp3 files, files I converted from .wav and recorded myself. They will not play and I cannot click on the record or play buttons, they ignore my clicks.