Do you get any errors ?
Sounds to me like you are either not detecting the hard drive or dos
You said
"Press <ESC> to switch to post or f2 to run CMOS setup"
Maybe my toshiba is different but when I press <esc> I get into bios and f2 is for selecting the boot device
You also said you pressed a lot of buttons
I understand it can be frustrating but perhaps you pressed a button that affects the way your laptop boots.
I would double check the bios or f2 to select the internal hard drive
either way you should get some errors and that will give you some clue as to where the problem is