Can only import select as root?

[Lester I. McCann]

I'm new to Python, just installed Python 2.1 from the source RPMs, and
tried to run a program.  It runs from root, but fails when run from a
normal user account.  I reduced the problem to something easily
demonstrated:

  [root]# python
  Python 2.1 (#2, Apr 19 2001, 16:57:12) 
  [GCC egcs-2.91.66 19990314/Linux (egcs-1.1.2 release)] on linux2
  Type "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
  >>> import select
  >>> 

As you can see, it imports select just fine.  But as myself:

  [mccann]$ python
  Python 2.1 (#2, Apr 19 2001, 16:57:12) 
  [GCC egcs-2.91.66 19990314/Linux (egcs-1.1.2 release)] on linux2
  Type "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
  >>> import select
  Traceback (most recent call last):
    File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
  ImportError: No module named select
  >>> 

PYTHONPATH is set the same in each environment.  My system is RedHat
6.2, and the source RPMs are those from
http://www.python.org/2.1/rpms.html.

What am I doing incorrectly?  Why doesn't the normal installation work
for a normal user account?  Thanks for any suggestions.

--lester

(If you'd rather reply to me directly, concatenate my last name and my
first initial and send to that account at acm.org.  Bloody spam...)