Tnx for the quick reply. Interesting. Three observations:
a) I can confirm that 'connect at power on' is enabled
b) hitting "ESC" after starting the VM leads to a GRUB boot menu. The choices are:
Linux Min 14 ...
Linum Mint 14 ... -recovery ...
Memory test ....
Memory test ... serial console ...
c) frantically hitting "ESC" while frantically clicking the mouse to activate the window will (1 in 14 times) give me the BOOT menu which correctly shows the desired boot order but is still followed by the GRUB menu.