UAC, or User Account Control has not much to do with admin rights...

There has been issues where a user has turned UAC off totally that has caused the issue you are having. If off, turn it back on to the default (2nd bar from the top) and then restart. This can sometimes fix this.

It was a well known issue in W XP (and early Vista), and Microsoft released a Hotfix for it...but it was supposed to be a non-issue in W7 and certainly not in 8.

As far as try again....open Windows Explorer right click in any white space in the right pane and create a new folder. Then at the top of the page select the View tab scroll to refresh and click it, if the new folder does not appear.

If the View tab is not there, at the top of the Explorer page under Organize, select Layout - Menu Bar.