windows vista - Pensioner and Skype setting up laptop to work automatically

I want to set up a laptop (Windows Vista Home Premium) to my 84-year-old mother's living room to use Skype with it.

The problem is she has mild dementia and is incapable of using the laptop. She lives alone.

I have Skype set up to automatically answer so everyone can call her and all she has to do is talk.

My problem is getting her laptop to close down and start up automatically e.g. at midnight and and 8 am. Is there a way to do this?

Ideally, if she could just flick the on/off switch at the mains socket and everything else is auto, it would be great.

Best scenario would be that the computer switches itself on and off at predetermined times and auto loads Skype.

Second best option would involve my mother switches computer on and off at mains switch, everything loads auto from there.

There's an option to wake up the computer at certain time in many BIOSes. If you set the Windows to login automatically and have Skype to start and login automatically, it would work as long as the laptop's lid isn't closed.

There's also option to shut down the computer from BIOS, but I have never tried it and don't know how it behaves with the operating system. I don't think it's a good idea if it just shuts the power off, so that Windows doesn't have time to shut down properly. So, I'd advise using e.g. Task Scheduler to turning the computer off.

You can also try to add these tasks to the task scheduler, with commands to sleep and wake at predefined times. But if you turn the computer off (or if the battery is empty) you will have to restart in manually.