I’ve only set up mysql through the command line. I would suggest that. There are probably steps in the setup that the gui tools think are ‘understood’ or that they are glossing over. I had a big problem with that the first time I tried to set up mysql.
I’m one of those nuts that thinks the command line is the best thing for configuring everything.
Oh shoot, I just realized you are using windows because I reread your last response.
I just assumed that you were setting this up on a linux box. I confessedly don’t have much experience setting up mysql on windows. Let me think about that and get back to you. You might try looking for a more generic setup guide for mysql. If you follow a different guide, I would uninstall and reinstall mysql.
Phpmyadmin is decent but what you’re asking is configuration questions. phpmyadmin isn’t going to tell you if you have a wonky (or extremely unusual) configuration.