When developing in concrete5, ensure all caching is turned off.
Your browser is probably loading a cached page..
Concrete5, when installed has caches turned on by default..

Thanks for the reply. Yes, I have turned off caching for development but even that cash page does not update unless I manually hit the reload button. This is very frustrating as it this worked fine in other versions. For instance, when adding an block class in edit mode I can select it and apply it however when entering the GUI again it is unselected. Sometimes it is sometimes its not and sometimes my custom template remains selected and sometimes not. The page approval version also seems all messed up. In another instance a previously deleted block will show up. I stopped page caching in chrome tools as well and that also does not fix the problem. Something drastic is up and makes this unusable.
Please let me know if you have any other suggestions.
Thanks much

Thank you wayboat that did the trick. Would you happen to know how to turn off or suppress the annoying pop-up approval window? ...the one that says this page is newer than the one that is live to the site visitors?
Thanks again,