Thread:Project:Support desk/New groups not recognized

I'm working on a MediaWiki 1.16.5 installation and had new groups created for my user base. The new groups did not inherit all of the wiki rights of the original groups (bot, bureaucrat, administrator). The difference between the groups is easily spotted under User Rights Management, where the new groups are not links as the original three are. This affects one of the extensions I'm using - it recognizes users as members of the original three groups but fails with the new groups. Is there a simple group configuration step that was overlooked?

Thank you in advance.