2009 13" MBP and the mini display port to hdmi?

[Imola Ghost]

Ok, so I bought a Rocket Fish mini display port to hdmi cable to hook up to my brand new LG lcd television. I use this tv as I travel a lot for work and bring it with me so I thought if I had a cable to connect my laptop to my tv, then I could watch some HBO while logged in to my ATT Uverse account.

I connected the cable and the television was displaying a entirely different wallpaper, it was the solar system wallpaper built into Lion. However I had the grass wallpaper as my back ground.

Also as soon as I went to either go to Safari the screen went fuzzy. I quit Safari and the solar system wallpaper was back.

What am I doing wrong or not doing?

 

[simsaladimbamba]

Is the external display set to "MIRROR DISPLAY" in System Preferences > Displays >> Arrangement?

 

[alust2013]

You are in extended display mode (which you want, since the TV and computer are different resolutions). You can simply drag a window off the right side of your screen and it will show up on the TV, and you have two different spaces to work with. You can change the background on them independently, it just shows up with the default for any new display you connect.