A few months ago I cleaned up my contacts, and added this particular person back in with a new contact card. I invited him to messenger though he never saw the invite. we are in each others messenger list but appear offline to each other and cannot send/receive messages either way.

Have Outlook Express up and running on XP PC, but use only as a backup.  Primarily using Win7 on newer PC and Hotmail (or is Hotmail just another name for Windows Live?  Or the reverse?  Everything sent from from Win7 PC (Hotmail) appears as though it was being sent from OE and has old e-mail address, which causes endless confusion as return mail is not coming to this PRIME Hotmail Address, but to OE on backup PC.