> it may be that grub was not installed. 

I agree; also double check that the drive you installed CentOS on is the drive that you're booting from?

I've (so far) installed with the default disk layout and package selection.

You may want to try specifying a /boot partition.

If all else fails, I've found this guide very useful
http://www.gnu.org/software/grub/manual/legacy/grub.html

You'll probably want this section: http://www.gnu.org/software/grub/manual/legacy/grub.html#Installing-GRUB-natively

Hope this helps,
Rob