Thanks for your responses fellas. I managed to - backdoor- some issues by downloading jRiver,# 22( apple support doesn't know of this software from Adam) which managed to give me a clean slate to work from.
I was able to re-establish my external HD WD My book 1TB, and began the long process of uploading my music again, about 500 cd's.
To answer your questions I have a 2012 mini running 10.85, Mountain Lion I believe, 8 gig Ram, I5, Samsung 250 internal SSD..
It seems my OSX became corrupted not my external HD. Called apple support, (very helpful" ) to reload 10.85. Naturally they wanted to upgrade
me to El Cap., but based upon what LJM advised, I didn't allow that to occur, thank you! And I will be getting a backup HD to avoid this mess. (not sure how to go about the transfer but I'll figure it out somehow). Any suggestions on the make and model would be appreciated.
So as it turns out I probably didn't have to Wipe my drive as the problem was a corrupt OSX! Isn't that just peachy!
I am almost back to normal, however I thought that when uploading I'm still pointed to the External HD and my music is all uploaded there, but I still have to go through Itunes to upload it and then it seems I have to Import each album into jRiver 22. If I remember correctly I don't remember having to do that. If anyone has some advice as to if there is a better way to do this, I'm all ears!!
Thanks Guys, I really appreciate your help.
Regards,
Paul