Hey. I just registered my AdSense account and am being instructed to setup the test code on my site. I did so in the Advertisements panel but I see no difference on my AdSense account. Could someone help me set up AdSense? I've never used it before. 

If you mean the stats, it takes some time for that to show up. You are looking at Performance Reports right?

The ads just aren't showing up at all is my problem. Should they be? http://tyrenale.net/forums <- my website 

I looked in the web inspector and I can even see the script source code for the ads but they are not displaying. I copied it directly and all.

It's there... Refresh or clear your cache! 

After you insert the ad, it takes about 5 minutes for it to show. Meanwhile the spot is blank. 

 

Really weird... I'm not seeing anything. Maybe AdSense just doesn't show publishers the ads served to their personal websites. Thanks though!

It should, however, there is a setting that will hide the ads from certain member's group. It's in the advertising section. You may want to peak. Otherwise you should be able to see it.

This will clear the cache just in case:
System -> Support -> Something isn't working correctly -> Continue (Ignore "What are you looking for?")

Make sure you are not running ad blocking plug in on your browser. 

Typically on a fresh start up it should display a blank box in the place of the ads. Another trick is to add the phrase "testing X ad position" at the bottom of each code. This will show you that the code is running.