Ok, so nothing seemingly getting through to your end…
Don’t know if it’ll help, but its often suggested here as a standard test scenario, to begin with a brand new, blank project and add VSTConnect to it. Now add an audio track and some material and proceed from there… nice and simple to start with… 
Anyway, sorry I can’t be of more direct help, but something to ponder in the meantime…
Good luck,
Bob
(PS:- just to check; latest versions of the software are v4.0.44 - is this what you both have running…?)