Try to add 'user=mysql' in [mysqld] section of /etc/mysql/my.cnf before doing 'apt-get install mysql-server'.
It worked for me. My problem was mysqld creating log files (/var/lib/mysql/[hostname]-bin.[number]) for innodb tables owned by root during the installation/upgrade. When started normally as mysql, mysqld didn't have permission to read/write these files. It looks like package installation script starts mysqld as root at first, and then as mysql.
Try to add 'user=mysql' in [mysqld] section of /etc/mysql/my.cnf before doing 'apt-get install mysql-server'.
It worked for me. My problem was mysqld creating log files (/var/lib/ mysql/[ hostname] -bin.[number] ) for innodb tables owned by root during the installation/ upgrade. When started normally as mysql, mysqld didn't have permission to read/write these files. It looks like package installation script starts mysqld as root at first, and then as mysql.