P R O B L E M ... S O L V E D ... ! ! ! 
Wow, because of your help and your final comment about the metapackages, I went ahead and opened up the package manager to look for that metapackage. There were several other files as well (gutenprint, pdf print, manufacturer driver files). So after searching specifically for "printer" I then installed anything and everything that looked as though it may have something to do with my setup. GUI tools as well. Everything is back the way that it was! I'm thrilled apesh*t silly.
I just installed the printer via GUI in start/system again. Afterwards I printed pdf and openoffice files from both the browser as well as within the applications. Everything worked all around. And the cups printing for the web browser can now be configured as well. No more blank page there.
Thank you so much for all of your help.
.
