Blue bar in bottom left corner of my screen won't load, and now no sound plays when I play my piece?

When I open Musescore, (on my computer), there is a little bar in the bottom left corner that has to load in and says something like "Musesounds loading" ... I never paid it much attention; however, it is nowhere to be found after I updated Musescore yesterday, and now no audio is playing after I click to play my piece.

Does anyone have a similar issue? Or, does anyone have any recommendations on what I can do to fix this issue?

Thank you!