Hey zep...I did it, I did it! I really did it! :) I can send and receive from each account. Each AOL screen name has to have its own account set up with proper port #s, matching user names, etc. raven, you're right...I just had to keep digging around. I found a Mozilla forum note from 2006 where someone had done a good job of explaining. Thank you again for pushing me on. Pam

Do you know where this 'Program1' is located on your computer? If so close Thunderbird, open Windows Explorer, drill down to the offending folder. right click on it, click rename in the drop down menu and rename it Program. See if that fixes your problem. Any help?

IMAP works such that what you do in the client is reflected to the server, and vice versa. That's the point of it vs. POP3. Any messages you want to retain on the GMail server, you can't delete them from the (IMAP) GMail account tree in Thunderbird. I *never* keep long-term copies of mail on a server. It's *my* mail, I want it archived to *my* computer. IMO there's too much risk of a hacker getting access by brute-force or a server-side security flaw. My computer is more secure, less likely to be hacked, and I can back up the data. I have messages in Thunderbird that date 10 years back. And archived data MUCH older from Outlook Express.

bugsybanks : Finally get back to this . . . . re : "Regarding the change to IMAP, I have 3 e-mail addresses set up through my server on the desktop and all 3 are now POP3 on that computer. Do I delete each account and then recreate it as IMAP? Will I lose the e-mails that have been saved under Local Folders? " One thing . . . my "Local folders" only contain Trash & Outbox. All my other Inboxes, etc. are within separate acct folders. I.E., each other acct. contains an Inbox, Drafts, Sent, etc. - outside of "Local Folders." Anyway, there's a good chance that after you create an IMAP acct., the email that you have already downloaded using POP mail, and deleted from the server - won't show up in the IMAP Inbox. You'd have to import them back in. Just to be safe, I would export all your email first so that you have it as backup. Then make new accts as IMAP. See if everything looks correct, or if you need to import anything from the backup you just made. Finally, delete the POP accts. There is a really handy addon tool for TB : ImportExportTools https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/thunderbird/addon/importexporttools/?src=search (That page looks complicated, but the use of the tool is not) The two different ways to export using that tool are - (and you get to the choices by right clicking on "Inbox" or any other folder) : 1) "Export folder" (w/ or w/o structure) This makes an Mbox file of everything that you export. It makes for just a few simple files that aggregate everything within the respective folders. So you will end up w/ one Inbox file, one Drafts file, etc. "Structure" just means you will keep the nested structure of the folders. The disadvantage is that you can't read them later w/o importing them back first (using ImportExportTools). 2) "Export all Messages" (and choose "eml" format here) This exports each email as a .eml file - and you can identify and read each one separately later after exporting. So if you export 500 emails, you'll get 500 .eml files. You can batch import them though using ImportExportTools. And you can read them just by clicking on them individually. There's no harm in exporting both ways if you like. Just create separate folders so you can keep it all straight. Play around with it a bit until you get the hang of it. For all the people recommending this way to do email or that - this debate has been going on for years. There are advantages and disadvantages to each - it really depends on your needs. I wouldn't say that any one of them is "unusual" as someone commented - what's unusual to one is likely normal to someone else. Personally I use them all, and all for different purposes - no one method seems to work for every purpose. I do use web based email for the most part though. Hope that helped. -Kent This post was edited by kbarb on Mon, Oct 20, 14 at 0:42