i feel a little better knowing I'm not the only one with this problem. I'm using the latest version of Safari. The old chat room worked fine.
I can no longer click on specific names, and after typing and entering text it stays in the text box. I have to manually delete it from the text box before entering more. If I use the send button on the site instead of the return on my keyboard, it boots me out altogether. They've tried tying me down, sitting on me... nothing works! Luckily I do have vowels! Someone gave me a tip on the avatar- if you upload your own instead of using one from this site it should work. It did for me..