I think I figured it out. The problem was with Outlook Express, even tho I do not use it... and I still cannot recall exactly what I did originally to generate the 'phantom' unread message..... sigh...
Here's what I did to fix it:
- first I made sure I was not logged on to Outlook 2003..... and I did this at a quiet time when there was minimum chance of receiving any incoming emails.
- I decided to activate Express by setting up an email address in Express. (The name I used was my regular email name)
- do not accept any prompt that may come up asking you if you want to make Express your 'main' email reader.
- once set up, I tested it by using the new email account sending myself an email.
- it came back to my email account as a new message
- I opened up the test message and then deleted it, closed Express, logged out of my system id. (I have XP) and my '1 unread mail message' had disappeared!!
- I logged back in opened up Express again, went to the Account option and deleted the new ID I had previously set up to avoid getting any further emails.
- exited Express and logged out and there haven't been any phantom unread messages since.
Gary Y
