>I know that I saw a website a while back at MS which had a table of upgradability for the various versions of Windows. My question is: is there a direct upgrade from ME to XP or does it require a wipe out of the partition and a clean install to put XP on a computer?

Hi Richard. According this this matrix, no removal of the partition is required. And the you files, data and setting will be kept. Back up though!
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/pro/howtobuy/upgrading/matrix.asp