Excel 2013 Starting With Two Windows?

Hello Faraz,

Thank you for contacting Microsoft community. We are glad to assist you with your concern.

As per the description, looks like the Excel application starts in two windows.

To resolve the issue, let us open Excel in application safe and check how they work.

To do that, press the ‘Windows + R’ key on the keyboard.

In the Run open box type in ‘Excel /safe’ and hit ok.

Note: There is a space between Excel and /.

If application safe mode works, try disabling the add-ins associated with Excel applications and check.

To do that, do the following:

1. Open the application. Click on File and then click on options.
2. In the Options Window click on Add-ins.
3. Select Com Add-ins in the Manage list in the Add-ins section and click Go. Now uncheck the all the add-ins and click Ok.

You may also refer to the section Additional troubleshooting in the following article and check if it helps:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/280504

If you still have questions, you can always reply and I’ll be happy to assist you.

Thank you

Here's what finally appears to have worked for me. I suspected that it had something to do with the PERSONAL.XLSB workbook so after closing a regular workbook and getting the blank gray window I went to View>Window and found that Unhide was the only option so I clicked that and then Hide and saved the change and now everything closes as it should.

Bloody annoying that no one in MS support has been any help on this.