Windows 98 to 2000

Hi All, my small non-profit uses a new Dell Inspiron running XP Professional and MS Office 2003. We have a database using MS Access 2003. I was recently given this older computer:
Dell Optiplex: Pentium III, 1 GHZ, 2 GB Hard Drive
284 RAM (I think), Windows 98, Office 97 professional.

My goal is to have Access 2003 working on the donated Dell Optiplex. Unfortunately, Windows 98 won't do it. I've been told that Windows 2000 would work, so I tried to order it through Tech Soup and got the message that I needed to order XP and then upgrade/downgrade, to Windows 2000. I've emailed the TS folks, but got no response. So, I went ahead and ordered the XP. Does anybody know if this is how it works? that I'm to order a copy of XP in order to downgrade it to 2000?

Would anybody know how long this will take?

Thanks, Rob in Illinois

Here are the instructions. Straight from the horse's mouth, so to speak.

Here

-Russ