no apps, new phones,,,,senior citizens, use phone only for calling purposes.....thanks

Have you recently installed any app before the notification started happening? That may be causing it.

As for your wife's name of a friend in the center of the screen, try press and holding on it for a second or two. See if you can move it or delete after.

only a news notification,also my wife has the name of a friend she called and a pink symbol in the center of her screen, i can not remove that either

only new news , 3-4 times daily.  would like to silence that feature.....now my wife has her friends name and a pink symbol in the center of her screen, want to erase, can not figure that one either

Hi John. Do you see any notifications on the phone? Like an unread message, a missed call, or maybe a social network notification?