Indeed. I've gone over the log very carefully (Debian is a good choice for this IMO) and it should have everything you need. I think the next option is to go over your Anope and MySQL logfiles to see what is going on here. Just to state some obvious possibilities...
I take it you have edited the 'MySQL configuration' block in your config file and made sure everything checks out (MysqlHost, MysqlUser, MysqlPort to name but a few options) ? Do make sure that if you're using a socket the program really does connect to your sql server, you can do so by checking the mysql logfile (I think from mind it to be in /var/log/mysql/mysql.log, but knowing Debian it might also be in /var/log/mysql.log). Another influence might be the 'UseRDB' option. If you just began with MySQL and as such your data resides in the .db files that could create some conflict since this option tells Anope to get all the config information from the SQL database.
Still, I think that by looking closely at your Anope and MySQL logfiles (added to this info) you should be able to pinpoint the weird stuff which is going on here.