Why can't I add photos to Lightroom? (New user)

[Bethany5E0B]

I added Lightroom to my new MacBook Air. When I try to add photos, I get a message saying "Checking free space on disk" (there should be plenty!)......and then nothing seems to happen for a very long time. Meanwhile, I've tried several times to just create an empty album to put these photos in once they are imported, but nothing seems to appear there after I title it. Can anyone advise? Thanks in advance. (BTW I have used Photoshop for years- just new to Lightroom.)

[Jim Wilde]

Can you post a screenshot of the Lightroom Preferences>Local Storage tab?

[Bethany5E0B]

Sure- here it is.

My photo library is on iCloud. I was trying to add 22 photos that I'd downloaded to a folder.

[Jim Wilde]

Looking at that screenshot, it would seem that Lightroom is having trouble reading the system drive. You say this is a new MBA, is it running Catalina by chance? If so, it may be a Catalina-inspired permissions issue, in which you need to check the permissions and make sure Lightroom is fully enabled.

[Bethany5E0B]

Thanks so much for your help! Yes, it's running Catalina 10.15.6 . How would I go about checking the permissions and enabling Lightroom? At what level would I be doing that?