Thanks to all the helpful advice (and referrals) I received from moondog and trublu, I went ahead and installed ExpressVPN a couple of days ago and I thought it could be worth giving a summary of the experience to date.

The purchase and installation procedures are quick and easy, helped by a very well laid out website, which includes an excellent troubleshooting section. I installed EVPN on my PC (Windows 7) and on my smartphone (Android 4.2.2);

Utilisation is very easy and use friendly, you can switch on and off at will and there is no effect on your existing connections or settings. Very reassuring !

I can obviously now use Google Chrome and also access stuff like Youtube, which is great. As regards connection speed, it is interesting to compare the performance on my two devices - I set it to Hong Kong 3 on my smartphone and it works like a dream, uninterrupted connections, fast access, no problems getting onto any sites...perfect. On my pc, it is a bit more temperamental - I have tried the three Hong Kong servers and also Los Angeles, Hong Kong 2 seems the best, but there are still times when the connection slows down. Also, there are a couple of sites, including Flyertalk, where the connection is much better without the VPN (the problems does not occur if I use my smartphone). That said, I know that selection of the optimal server takes a bit of getting used to, so I'm not complaining !

To sum up, I am very happy with the product, especially on my smartphone, and as a non computer literate user I have no problems with utilisation.

Thanks again to moondog and trubu!