SureAI

When starting a new game, I get the confirmation question that asks if I want to start a new game, and when I hit yes, the game makes the loading sound, but doesn't leave that screen. I still see the Skyrim dragon symbol on the left and the fog moving about. The Skyrim theme song continues to play, and Skyrim's resource usage goes to a bare minimum in task manager.

Something went wrong during the installation.
Try to rename your Skyrim folder to "Skyrim_manualbackup".
Download a clean Skyrim. Install Skyrim. Follow these steps.

I did a fresh install of Skyrim last night after I posted this. I am still having the same issue. I redownloaded the launcher and hit install, and it said my installation package was invalid or damaged. Redownloading the package now.

Good move! Maybe try a different hoster than before. We recommend torrent (over browser downloads). Some browsers can't handle 8GB downloads.

Redownloaded and installed, works perfectly.