Help! No PERMANENT mapset

Hi,

I'm another beginner at this thing.
I had been trying to do the following:
Create a new location. From the startup screen seems to work but it doesn't ask
for any coordinate system.
Then I try to import an ascii file. Comes back with an error msg that says "
ERROR: region for current mapset is invalid
       <projection field missing>
       run "g.region"

so I run g.region and it comes back with another error.
ERROR: default region is not set

Any ideas?
Thanks and happy holidays (mine don't look that great now)

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Enrique Reyes e-mail: reyes@cbl.umd.edu
Chesapeake Biological Lab phone: 410 326-7249
PO Box 38 fax: 410 326-7354
Solomons, MD 20688