The EXACT same thing just happened to me!! I left to eat dinner during the opening dialogue, came back, pushed A a few times, and lo and behold, I die as soon as gameplay begins. Then my inventory (and C buttons) are suddenly filled with ocarinas. As a Deku Scrub, I still have these ocarinas. I tried playing the Song of Time, but to no avail. When I found some Deku Nuts, they just replaced one of the Ocarinas right in the middle of the item screen. When I got to the Happy Mask Salesman, all I had to do was start a second dialogue, and he taught me the Song of Healing BEFORE I LEARNED THE SONG OF TIME. So I'm Link again, and I haven't even entered Clock Town yet. XD