I have done so yes, and I confirmed that just now. When I make the change from 'user' to 'administrator' and click submit, the page changes and it says
'Information
Permissions have been updated

Click Here to return to User Permissions

Click Here to return to the Admin Index'

but when I return to that page, it's still the same, nothing changed. It seems like it's just not trying or not able to update the database, but I cant find the location of that info in the database.