In Windows Live mail, inbox filled up with old deleted mail , sent mail went into storage

I opened up my email account and clicked on " inbox". Hundreds of emails kept appearing. The more I deleted, the more would appear. I did not know how to stop them. Looked around for an answer and decided to click "read" to see if this would make a difference. The input of emails stopped. However...all my emails in my "sent" folder now have gone to "sent storage folder". The name at the bottom of the sent email that is now in storage has changed to my email address. I presume because the emails were sent into storage. Questions are: Why would my "inbox" fill up with emails? I thought they were old deleted ones now I wonder if they were my sent emails. Can I restore the emails in sent storage to the original folder? I did try a system restore..but no change. All my contacts had disappeared as well however...I did find the answer in one of the forums and they have all been restored. If I had to many sent emails in a folder, could that have caused the problem? Thanks so much. Mara