Windows 10 comes with a search icon (a magnifying glass) in the taskbar. If you don't use that (as you can search by clicking on the Windows (Start Menu) icon), you can get rid of it as follows:
Right-click on a free spot in the taskbar.
Hover over "Cortana" and the click "Hidden".
That's it.
If you have disabled Cortana, the menu sequence is "Search" > "Hidden".
Sometimes it is faster to access Control Panel items via command line than clicking and searching in the UI. To use a command, just press <Windows-Key>-R, which will open the Run window. Then just type the command and press <Enter>.
For the .cpl files, the "control" command can even be left out, so that is even less to type.
Control Panel Applet
Command
OS
Accessibility Options
control access.cpl
XP
Action Center
control /name Microsoft.ActionCenter
8, 7
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