Dear #BeagleBoard Friends,
A suggestion: when one wants to flash from the flasher image, one does not actually have to do the entire login and change the boot file; it just does it the moment you install the sd card with the flasher image and boot.
Yes, I'm sure this is obvious, but only when you're not methodically following the Get Started Steps where it says IF YOU WANT TO FLASH CHANGE THIS AND REBOOT.
Summary: if you download the flash image to sd and boot from that, ti's auto.