I doubt it's a bad USB port since Puppy worked on it. If you deleted Puppy with gparted it's too late to change the SELinux settings and the bootloader file could now be corrupted on the drive head sector. It's now a BIOS issue. Reset your BIOS to default and the cmos clock, Save and exit. Shut down again and enter BIOS again, enable Legacy boot, disable fast boot, disable secure boot, make sure the cmos clock is correct, make sure USB ports are set to live pre-boot, save and exit and then run a one time boot menu (Often F12 key} and boot LL from the USB.
TC
TC
All opinions expressed and all advice given by Trinidad Cruz on this forum are his responsibility alone and do not necessarily reflect the views or methods of the developers of Linux Lite. He is a citizen of the United States where it is acceptable to occasionally be uninformed and inept as long as you pay your taxes.