I am trying to create an actor, following the actor creation tutorial on the creationkit website, but when i get up to selecting the race for my actor it doesn't give me any information, the drop-down box is... empty. The tutorial seems to suggest you can just pick a race out of the dropdown menu in the traits tab of creating an actor but there is nothing there.

How would I get around this to make an actor?

Try using a base actor, selecting all the inheritable qualities so they load up on your new actor's window, then de-select them. You should be able to change everything at that point.