Product key for genuine Windows 7 not working

This past January I bought a new Toshiba Satellite (L745-S4210) laptop, which came with the full, genuine version of Windows 7 Home Premium. I have the product key on the bottom of my laptop (I'm not sure if I should post it here or not - please let me

know if I need to).

This past October my computer contracted a virus that required everything on my computer to be uninstalled and erased off the hard drive, and the entire system needed to be rebooted. Everything was going fine until the past two or three weeks. A pop-up

on my laptop kept saying, "The Windows 7 Home Premium product key you typed is invalid for activation." I wasn't sure what that meant until the past couple of days, when my screen told me my Windows 7 copy was "not genuine." I've repeatedly typed in the product

key listed on the bottom of my laptop to activate Windows, and it will not recognize it.

My question is, is there any way I can get my product key to work (or get a different product key) without having to pay for another one? I paid plenty for my laptop to have a genuine version of Windows 7, and I paid a good chunk of money to get my computer

rebooted after the virus. I really don't want to have to buy another Windows 7 product key because a reboot wiped out my original one. Is there ANY WAY I can fix this for free?

Thank you so much in advance for your help.

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