I just bought iTunes Match. I said to "start" it, but it is stuck on step 1. The bar looks full and nothing happens. It's dead. What to do?

I just purchased iTunes Match. I pressed the Start button and the program won't move past step 1, getting info about my itunes library. The blue bar looks complete, but it won't move to step 2. When I press stop and then start again, the blue bar fills quickly and it just stops. I'm on itunes version 11.0.1 (12).

What is the problem and how can I get this thing to work? Thanks for your help! I'm not a computer geek and this is frustrating. :-)