New Install, apps start but don't show up on screen?!

[RT3]

Because it's on an SD card, and not the eMMC, I was able to pull the card and mount it elsewhere. I've gotten so far as to discover it doesn't have ssh installed, so I can't just log in and work on it from the inside. I'm going to try and get a Pi going and do a chroot to install ssh. Maybe while logged in that way, and thus "watching live," I can figure it out.

What I don't know about the window manager / windowing system is virtually 100% of it, I'd only guess it runs some flavor of x11?  Anyway, even with that ignorance, I'm guessing one of these is the cause:

1) Display Server Issues: The issue may stem from the display server not properly rendering the application windows, even though the window manager is functioning.

2) Session Management: There could be a problem with how the session is managed, preventing applications from displaying their interfaces correctly. (I doubt this, though, because the outer layer works perfectly.)

3) Configuration Files: Corrupted or misconfigured user or system configuration files could lead to this behavior.

I've also dumped the journal files to text and have them available but don't know what to look for.

Ideas?!