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There is a limit to what you can install old versions of Microsoft Windows on, hardware-wise. You may be thinking, "yeah, that's obvious," but the line is close. By that I mean that a PC Designed for Windows XP most likely contains hardware whose drivers absolutely do not exist for Windows 9x. This was my painful discovery on the Fujitsu Lifebook P1120. There are Windows 2000 and Windows XP drivers for the odd Fujitsu variant of the ATI Rage Mobility M video adapter with double the VRAM of the usual version (a whopping 8MB!), but no extent Win9x driver. The actual ATI Rage Mobility M and Mobility M+ driver for Win9x do not work for the LB1120 under Win9x. Blue screens follow if you disregard the warning that you should not be installing it.
It was at this point that I had the epiphany that I should stick with computers released between 1993 and 2000 for running Win9x, with the sweet spot being 1996-1999. Any odd hardware should be avoided. Popular and standard hardware should be preferred. This is the assemblage of well supported items that make life easier.
With resignation, I installed AntiX Linux on the Fujitsu. I like the distro so far. It is systemd free, Debian based, resource frugal, and peppy on the 16 year old mini-laptop I stuck it on. It plays chocolate-doom, and DOS games in emulation very well, so I can do some of what I wanted to do with it if I were able to slap Windows ME on it and get it to work. I will eventually try again on a more common laptop... I already bought the OEM disc and other supplies.