Vim plugins only show after :Plugin* command

Question

I've installed Vundle and some plugins along with it. However, the plugins only activate after I've run :PluginInstall or :PluginList in vim.

$ vim takes me to a plain vim without any plugins.

and once I run :PluginInstall I'm greeted with a multi-pane vim like such: multi pane vim with plugins

Note that the plugin LightLine is installed. Also note that once I switch over to the right most pane, there are two vim status bars: the one LightLine status bar and the plain --INSERT-- status bar. This makes me think I'm somehow running vim inside of vim...

My .vimrc for reference

set nocompatible
filetype off
set rtp+=~/.vim/bundle/Vundle.vim
call vundle#begin()
    Plugin 'VundleVim/Vundle.vim'
    Plugin 'itchyny/lightline.vim'
    Plugin 'jiangmiao/auto-pairs'
call vundle#end()
"set rtp+=/usr/local/opt/fzf
"nnoremap > $
"nnoremap < 0
"set autoindent
"set smartindent
filetype plugin indent on
syntax on
" Language specific syntax
" autocmd FileType * set tabstop=2|set shiftwidth=2|set expandtab
" autocmd FileType python set tabstop=4|set shiftwidth=4|set expandtab

I'm using a homebrew installed Vim 8.1 and this is the output of :set runtimepath runtimepath=~/.vim,~/.vim/bundle/Vundle.vim,~/.vim/bundle/lightline.vim,~/.vim/bundle/auto-pairs,/usr/local/share/vim/vimfiles,/usr/local/share/vim/vim81,/usr/local/share/vim/vimfiles/after,~/.vim/after,~/.vim/bundle/Vundle.vim,~/.vim/bundle/Vundle.vim/after,~/.vim/bundle/lightline.vim/after,~/.vim/bundle/auto-pairs/after

Any idea why vim would behave this way?

Answer 1

Silly me: plugins are loading properly, it's just that lightline wasn't showing up because I needed to add set laststatus=2 to my .vimrc.