pre-installed whats app stuck and can't remove or replace. Help!

[Wunderkind]

I have a Redmi 3 with MIUI 8 stable 8.0.1 (LAICNDG). There's a version of Whats App that I've been using for years that I think came preinstalled (It has a lock on the icon). Problem is that now it opens and stays frozen on the Google Drive backup page. Then it won't let me backup (I'm not able to select my Google account). I've tried removing this app and installing a new version from the play store. I can use the new version, BUT then I keep getting an extremely annoying popup every few minutes from whats app saying something about verifying the old account! Ideally I'd like to permanently uninstall the preinstalled version of whats app. If that's impossible, how can I get the the preinstalled version to link to Google Drive for backup?