When I open up the Vim editor, it's supposed to show at the bottom of the screen whether I'm in Input mode or not. But it stays blank whether I'm in Command mode or in Input mode.
Also, vimtutor doesn't work. All I get is a blank screen without any instructions.
It's the same whether I open up a terminal or use a virtual console.
Any ideas what might be wrong?
From your experience with vimtutor, it looks like you have the basic version of vim installed (vim-tiny). It is just a step above the old school vi in the evilutionary ladder, so try installing a more feature-complete version:
sudo apt-get install vim
Or, to get GVim as well:
sudo apt-get install vim-gnome
And do remember to call vim instead of vi. If you still can't see the status indicator, enable showmode:
:set showmode
