Hello Glencoe Glen,

We are hard to tell you what is that issues without access in your site

When I attempt to post something, 1) I am unable to select an author. The Modal window comes up but clicking on a name does nothing.

Can you turn on your error_reporting to Maximum from your backend > global configuration > Server and open your development console tool from your browser ( http://screencast.com/t/fBjwxbyBEUt )? And see what error you hitting when you click on the author link?

If I leave the author as default and attempt to post it tells me I need to have a min of 250 characters (I set this restriction and the post is WAY more than this requirement).

I have a little lost here, do you mean that when you enter over 250 characters, it still unable to allow you publishing the blog post right?

Can you temporary upload your site to live site so we can debug on this quickly? Please advise.