Hi paflinn!
It’s really going to be hard to sort all of this out with multiple attempts that have not worked, AND not knowing exactly what the hosting support folks did. Since you are still early in the setup process, you might really be better off (that is, it will take less time) just starting over. If you have content in the main site that you’d like to preserve, go to Tools – Export, and export all your pages and posts. If there are media files related to those pages/posts, in the cPanel file manager, go to wp-contents, select the uploads folder, compress/zip it, download and save it in a safe location on your computer.
Then, delete all the files related to this failed multisite, including the .htaccess file, leaving no files or directories in the public_html folder. This assumes of course, that you don’t have other sites in this hosting account! (The server may regenerate a cgi-bin folder, but it should be empty). You don’t have to delete database & user, but don’t re-use them — start with a fresh database!
Then have a read through this post about what you need to know before you start a network, and use this set of instructions for creating your network.
If that new install has issues, please come back here and I can try to help you with that!
Thanks, Beth, I had come to the conclusion I would need to start from scratch, also. I had already exported my site so I just need to do the media.
So I’m just going to delete the public files and will not need to re-install WordPress itself, correct? I have read the first link you listed but the second link is broken. Can you re-send? Thanks!
Nope. You will delete EVERYTHING, and start by installing WP from scratch. Don’t restore the site from a backup, which may perpetuate the problem. ONLY use an export of your pages/posts.
This export will not save your media, so save the uploads folder in your existing site. Once you have created a fresh WP install and verify that it works, then import those pages/posts, and FTP over the media files that you saved. Verify that everything works – the pages and posts are there, the media is appearing, etc. If anything is not working on this newly created single site (which will become the main site of the network), do not proceed with the network configuration until you have solved those issues.
THEN, here are the instructions to follow for creating your multisite network out of that site
https://codex.wordpress.org/Create_A_Network
Good luck! Don’t hesitate to come back if you run into more issues.
Just wanted to report (sorry it took so long) this issue is resolved. I killed the whole site and started from scratch several times over the course of a weekend because my .htaccess disappeared and I began getting messages about a different type of error. Bluehost got my file back and did something so that the existing error message disappeared. Happily my site is up and i was able to create a second site. I’m having different issues now but at least not this one. Thanks.
Glad you got at least this part working! Thanks for coming back and letting us know!
