@frfailing1946 , while in your frustration you have decided to do the return by hand, one sentence in your original post that caught my eye -- sale of your home ( and not requiring to report/ recognize the sale ) is possibly incorrect. I say possibly because if you do receive a 1099-S then you do have to report / recognize the sale else NO.
Generally you would have to report the sale --- your basis ( purchase cost plus cost of any and all improvements over the years ), your sales proceeds ( sales price LESS sales expenses such as fixing up specifically for the sale/showing, commissions, title insurance, transfer taxes etc etc.), date of acquisition and date of sale. TurboTax will uses these details to work out if your gain is excludable and that is it.
Does that make sense ( is it possible that Turbo Tax is asking for upgrade because of this , i.e. it knows that you have 1099-S ? )?
pk
