I have Earthlink, and through them I have several email accounts for different uses. I also have several different email programs resident on my computer to retrieve my mail. That means they access it on the server, load it completely onto my computer, and I have set it up to then delete it from the server.

I can also reach the same email accounts via a web interface, and that is where I see the filtering that goes on with my account. For ages I couldn't figure out where the spam was going (this is several years ago) after getting messages saying there was suspect spam to look at. I finally found a link in the web mail to view the spam. Every so often something I want ends up in there, such as things I've sent myself from third party websites, like you mention. Mostly I just delete it all without more than a glance at a few names. I just now deleted 155 spams from that online spam collector for one address.

See if you have a comparable web interface for your mail. I use Netscape's Communicator (the old version--the new one was messed up when AOL bought it), Pegasus Mail, and Eudora to retrieve my mail from the server. But I have to use the web interface via a browser for all the rest, because it won't move off of the server unless I move it to the "Inbox."

SRS