Oh, yes, come on a forum looking for help and call everyone who looks at your little thread "unhelpful" is a good way to...get help...wait, NO IT'S NOT. So, to be helpful even though I don't think you deserve it: don't use Norton. There. Problem solved!
Unless you run the server in offline mode and work the launcher to run with your user name (don't ask how, I have no clue), your inventory will be empty and your name will be "Player" when you join the server.
I have no problems connecting - I'm guessing it's a java path or batch file issue, since you have been experiencing these problems just since updating. I would advise reading the stickies and making sure you have your Java set up and the path typed correctly, and that both server and client are set up to use Java 7 (or at least the server). Oh, and the stars should be aligned too.