Access denied for user: '@localhost'

Hi, this problem seems to have appeared after a system upgrade ... command line works fine mysql -uschool -pbonfire school BUT <?php

    /* Connecting, selecting database */
    $link = mysql_connect("localhost", "school", "bonfire")
        or die("Could not connect : " . mysql_error());
    print "Connected successfully";
    mysql_select_db("school") or die("Could not select database". mysql_error());

?> results in the following error Connected successfully Could not select database Access denied for user: '@localhost' to database 'school' the logfile shows this ...

030602 18:47:01      33 Connect     sean@localhost as anonymous on
                     33 Init DB     Access denied for user: '@localhost' to database 'school'
                     33 Quit

Any ideas why the connection is being made as anonymous instead of with the details supplied ??? I'm running debian/testing which is up to date and all relavent systems are default install with some config changes... I've tried re-building from scratch apache + php using the latest tarballs (installed to a different location) and still get the same error I've also tried connecting to a different mysql server (same error) - in fact php still tries to connect to localhost ! I'll try installing a new version of mysql ... but any other ideas would be much appreciated -- Sean