Because most users access their e-mail via a POP account, we’ll spend the bulk of this chapter examining the two most popular POP e-mail programs, Outlook Express and Netscape Messenger. If you use another program to access your e-mail, you’ll need to adapt these instructions to match your particular program. Rest assured, however, that most e-mail programs have very similar functions and operations, so they’re not very difficult to figure out.
Microsoft’s Outlook Express is the e-mail program included with both the Internet Explorer browser and the Windows operating system. It’s a very versatile e-mail program—so versatile, in fact, that it also handles Usenet newsgroup postings. (See Chapter 12, “Newsgroups, Message Boards, and Mailing Lists,” for more information.)