No problem, Carlie. This whole thread has been quite enlightening to me.
UPDATE: I filed for SMC in May 2013. In July, I got a letter from VA telling me that they had received my application for PENSION. Sure enough, EBenefits shows that I now had a claim opened for pension--something that I didn't request, and of which I'm not elgible.
I visited my DAV office and voiced my concerns. They told me that I had to speak to the VA regarding this, so I waited an extra 30 minutes to speak with a VA rep.
Of course, the VA rep told me that they couldn't help me, and that I needed to speak with DAV (again).
OK, enough of this crap. I went back to the DAV, and said I needed to speak with a VSO. The receptionist tried to blow me off again, but I interrupted her, and told her that It appeared that my claim had been misapplied, and the DAV had to fix it. She begrudgingly told me to wait for the VSO.
The VSO admitted that "an error had been made," and assured me that it would be fixed post-haste. By the time I got home, EBenefits showed that the PENSION claim was closed out, and a COMPENSATION claim was created with the correct creation date.
The moral of the story seems to be in harmony with some of the comments on this thread: the Veteran needs to do his own research and understand the process. Were it not for this forum, I wouldn't have noticed the discrepancy, and my claim would've probably been denied (after languishing around for months and months). I had to spot the error, and force the VSO to correct it. Lesson learned.