Agreed on the seal. Also, it shouldn't take 24 hours... it should take a couple hours at most... otherwise you have seal issues.
Also, I noticed you said you used hot water. Hot water will kill the yeast. You want to use luke warm to warm water. I realize all of that is relative... so somewhere in the high nineties seems to be good.
You are incorrect. Bread rises due to warm temperature in the dough. Bread is not 300 degrees the second you put it in the oven. It rises quickly as the interior of the dough starts to warm. Once it is HOT, the yeast is dead, but their work is done. Same principle here. WARM is good, gets the yeast activated and working. HOT kills them.