fyi, I figured it out.... I wanted to lock the database from changes, and used this command in localsettings.php
$wgReadOnly = 'site maintenance';
Unexpectedly, this is the reason for the problem. Nothing in the MediaWiki documentation warns that the database will be unusable. I expected that users could continue to use the site in read-only mode. If anyone has a reason for this, I'd be interested to hear your explanation. To solve the issue, I revoked user editing rights to lock it down. All is well now. Thanks,
- Evelyn ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Evelyn Yoder www.longjumpsupport.com