phpMyAdmin won"t display databases

sorry..this is directed specifically to phpMyAdmin.

when I go to mysite.com/phpMyAdmin, on the left column it says "no
databases"
but I can manually tell it

USE 'my_database_name';
SELECT * FROM my_table;

and the contents are shown as expected... which means the database
exists, i'm properly logged in, I have access to view my table....but
for some reason it won't list the databases?

after running the above query, it shows

Server: my_sql_server - Database: my_database_name - Table:
my_table

but when I click my_database_name so I can view a list of my other
tables, it just keeps trying to load the page until it times out.

anyone have any idea what's wrong?