Admin PW not working

I am quite a noob at tails but I have read the documentation thoroughly and tried to look this up but no dice... I set up an admin password when i booted tails (this is not an issue with confusing it with perisistent files) but when i try to use it it does not work. It works with sudo in the console but not otherwise. I have tried redownloading, I have tried maybe 20 different passwords of different lengths and with and without caps and numbers (and my computer is new enough that I can't imaging it would be a keypad problem). I am at a loss, it is going to be difficult to use tails without this whole capability... if anyone has any ideas for other things to try or where specifically to go to learn myself how i could troubleshoot I would really appreciate