I appreciate the feedback. I know that I can easily clone the production server. I guess I am uncomfortable with the details. I will need this test clone vm up and running for a week or so in tandum with the production vm. I don't understand how I can simply bypass the license key part of the clone due to Windows licensing. I also would like to discuss how I would clone this vm since it has a production SQL database running on it. If I clone it to a different Windows name, the databases will still reference the old server name etc.
I guess I could clone it and restore the databases to it with a different name but again I don't understand how licensing would work doing this.