CACHE.
Windows will, by design use RAM for CACHE even for trivial things and this can really irk those that seek more free RAM.
This, why and more are the subject of many prior discussions. Nothing's broken.
Bob
Task manager demonstrates that I have 5.8 gigs in use, while on the 'users' tab, it displays I'm only utilizing ~1 gig.
Something pretty critical is evidently not appearing on task manager and eating 4.8 gigs of my available memory (7.9).
For some background info, this has been going on for a long while (the fact that task manager hiding actual amounts of memory usage), however today, I booted up my PC to see 70% of my memory to be already in use. Only programs I had manually launched were Steam and Chrome - taking up roughly 500 Mb.
This is enormously irritating, knowing that over half my memory is devoted to a service/ software I am not even aware of.
Also, using Windows 8.1, and Malware-bytes has not detected any malware as a side note.
Thank you all in advance.

Chowhound
Comic Vine
GameFAQs
GameSpot
Giant Bomb
TechRepublic