I went out and threw the batteries in it, and am still getting the same issues. On another note, this time I did get all of the lights in the 4x4 switch to light up upon starting, but attempting to switch it out of neutral, there was no further action from the switch - the "N" light just stayed illuminated. It seems that there are quite a few electrical issues going on, this time when I started it with fresh batteries I lost all my gauges as well - but I did push the E-brake all the way down, maybe I hit some wires....I don't know.

Someone had made mention that it could be the Body Control Module that is bad, it did have some weird electronic issues in the past (the AC intermittently working, the window switches intermittently working).

Maybe I bit off more than I can chew here, but at the price point I'm not overly concerned.