Using Audacity on Mac and problems in relying on VoiceOver only

Try not using a space. Pressing p should put the cursor where you want it, but space will reset it.

If the process you described is exactly what you're doing, then you missed one crucial step: after you pause, hit the [ (left bracket) key to set the cursor/selection start. Then once you stop with space, your selection start point should remain where you were paused. If you can import without hitting space, that's great, but I don't think you can import a track if the playback is simply paused, similar to how you have to stop playback in order to apply an effect. Let me know if this helps - if not I'll fire up Audacity next chance I get and figure out exactly how I do this...

Actually, I have a question, too:

When I use Audacity on my MacBook, there is a selection toolbar that I can interact with, which provides information such as the timecode of the current selection start and end, among other things. I recently got a Mac Mini for the office and downloaded Audacity, and I can't interact with that toolbar. In fact, I don't have any toolbars - I have a handful of controls that appear in toolbars on my MacBook, but on my Mini they're just all there in the main window, and it's not nearly all the controls that should be there.

I checked in the View menu, and plenty of toolbars, including the selection toolbar, are checked. Does anyone have any idea why I can't see it, and/or how I can navigate to it? Also, any ideas why it would look different on this computer? Could I have an older version of Audacity on my MacBook? If someone could confirm whether the latest version of Audacity behaves more like the description from my MacBook or my Mini, that would be helpful. Thanks!