[Solved] getting My Documents path on windows 7 (and vista)

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MFC

hi, i have some old code from win2000 days

it uses this code

if(!SHGetSpecialFolderLocation( 0, CSIDL_PERSONAL, &pidl ) ){
    if(SHGetPathFromIDList( pidl, path ) ){
        rootPath = path;
    }
}

to get the path to My Documents and has worked fine for a long time

now when i compile and run it, it returns the path 'C:\Users\steve\Documents'

however, a quick look in C:\Users\steve shows that the folder is called 'My Documents' (note, i'm on windows 7, standard installation as far as i can remember)

if i go to the start menu and select Documents, i get to Libraries\Documents which in reality is exactly the same place as 'C:\Users\steve\My Documents'

but at no point in any of this is does 'C:\Users\steve\Documents' seem to exist

this is a problem when i try to open a file with fopen with a path 'C:\Users\steve\Documents\myfile.txt' or whatever

interestingly, i have a file tree app that takes the root path the above code and it works file, it finds all the files

CFileFind finder; finder.FindFile( root+_T("*.*") );

so i'm very confused, i realize this is microsoft playing mind games with me, i'm just looking for a way to get a real path to the Documents folder


UPDATE:
Solved by OP himself - posted as one of the answers.