TAMPA, Fla. — It was supposed to be the start of their four-day effort to sell Mitt Romney to the nation, but Monday instead proved to be a day of frustration for Republicans as the delay in beginning their convention deprived them of their national stage and brought a fresh airing of intraparty tensions.

As Tropical Storm Isaac brushed past the convention here Monday, it moved slowly on a more dangerous path toward New Orleans, growing stronger by the hour. Forecasters on Monday afternoon predicted that the storm would land somewhere in southeastern Louisiana as a Category 2 hurricane, just as Republicans were set to kick their gathering into high gear.

While there were predictions of winds of 100 miles per hour accompanying the storm, most menacing was the prospect of the enormous amounts of water that Isaac will be bringing ashore. Residents in low-lying areas were urged to leave because of the possibility of storm surges as high as 12 feet along the Gulf Coast and heavy rainfall.

With the convention already delayed by one day, Mr. Romney was heading to Tampa on Tuesday with his top aides eager to quickly hold the roll call vote to officially make him the party’s presidential nominee for fear that the storm could cause further disruption. Party leaders gaveled the convention to order Monday to mark the formal opening of the event and then adjourned it.

The Romney campaign’s decision to postpone most events for a day because of the storm deprived the party of the carefully prepared convention script that was to keep a super-tight focus on Mr. Romney and a still tighter lid on discord.

With the vacuum created by the postponement, “everybody who has a reason to be upset about something has time to talk about it,” said Drew McKissick, a South Carolina delegate. And, as seen Monday, to try to do something about it.

Mr. McKissick was busy rallying support to fight Mr. Romney’s legal team over new party rules that he said would hinder the kind of insurgent challenges that Mr. Romney has faced this year — a clash that appeared to have been resolved enough to prevent it from spilling onto the convention floor Tuesday.

A day of closed-door talks between Romney aides and conservative activists ended with a compromise that one person involved said would “result in what we think is a very warm and fuzzy convention.” Some activists announced that they had succeeded in preventing what they called a power grab by the party establishment.

But supporters of Representative Ron Paul of Texas expressed frustration over what they said were efforts by Mr. Romney’s aides and supporters to silence their voices in the convention hall. They were goaded along by Mr. Paul, who has declined a speaking slot, accusing the Romney campaign of trying to control his message.

And supporters of Representative Todd Akin, the Missouri Senate candidate who lost much of the party’s support after his comments on “legitimate” rape and pregnancy, revived Tea Party-infused arguments against the “establishment” wing of the party, saying Mr. Romney and “party bosses” had abandoned him after his remarks.

All of it unfolded before a restless audience of about 4,500 delegates and 16,000 journalists left with little to do but stare at television screens covered with images of Isaac bearing down on the Gulf Coast, a haunting reminder of Hurricane Katrina — and, in this context, the political damage its aftermath caused to George W. Bush.

“The fact that we shut down today is a great tribute to the ghost of Katrina,” said John Hager, a former lieutenant governor of Virginia who is also, it happens, the father-in-law of Mr. Bush’s daughter Jenna.

The storm also posed a delicate challenge for President Obama, whose efforts to manage the response may have given him a moment to look presidential in Mr. Romney’s absence, but were also fraught with the risk of appearing to take advantage of a natural disaster at a highly politicized moment.

Convention planners said they had no regrets about their decision to postpone Monday’s activities. And they said in interviews that any ripples of discord on Monday would be forgotten by Tuesday night, when Mr. Romney’s wife, Ann, will speak, followed by the keynote speech by Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey.

“Nothing is going to happen that is anything more than noise,” Newt Gingrich said in an interview Monday evening, dismissing the worry in the air among some senior Republicans. “We’re going to leave here united and with enormous energy, enthusiasm and eagerness to defeat Barack Obama.”

But a growing group of grass-roots conservative activists said the extra day had given them time to mobilize support for their right to quash the effort by Mr. Romney’s legal team to give party presidential nominees more say over the selection of convention delegates sent by the states. Such a rule change would have taken the wind out of insurgent candidacies like that of Rick Santorum, who, until he dropped out, was counting on swinging uncommitted delegates to his side at the convention in a challenge to the presumptive nominee.

Such a change would have presumably also helped Mr. Romney, if he wins the presidency, to head off a potential primary challenge four years from now, some opponents said.

“It definitely was helpful to communicate the message to the grass roots,” said A .J. Spiker, the chairman of the Iowa Republican Party and a supporter of Mr. Paul during the primaries. “The leaders of the Republican Party have an obligation to protect grass-roots activists.”

The upstart talk, reminiscent of the primaries, extended beyond the fight over the party’s nominating procedures. At a Tea Party “unity rally” on Sunday night, Herman Cain told attendees, “There were some people who hoped you all wouldn’t show up,” adding, “Y’all fooled them!” Mr. Cain, who endorsed Mr. Romney in May, had earlier said on CBS News that he would have been his party’s nominee if “everyone had competed fairly and honestly.”

Even when the Republican national chairman, Reince Priebus, gaveled the convention to order and unveiled two national debt clocks — a symbolic barb at government spending under Mr. Obama — a group of Ron Paul supporters were staging a demonstration in the hall with signs that altered the convention’s “We Can Do Better” theme so they read “Ron Paul Can Do Better.”

“They want to make everyone think that we all are united behind Romney. That’s not true,” said Jeremy McReynolds, 25, an activist helping to organize Mr. Paul’s delegates at the convention.

Saul Anuzis, a delegate from Michigan and a Romney supporter, said those making “mischief” should settle down and fall in line behind Mr. Romney for the good of the party.

“What you would hate to see happen is they minimize the positives with all of their shenanigans,” Mr. Anuzis said.

“The reality is, it’s over.”