Total Noob Question: emails can't be cleared...

G'day all. I have to ask this as probably the first of many stupid questions to come...as it's driving me batty.
I've got two Macs here at home, a MacBook Pro which seems *touch wood* to have been pretty faultless and an iMac.
The hardware overview on the iMac says this:
Model Identifier: iMac7,1
Processor Name: Intel Core 2 Duo
Processor Speed: 2 GHz
Number Of Processors: 1
Total Number Of Cores: 2
L2 Cache: 4 MB
Memory: 1 GB
Bus Speed: 800 MHz
Boot ROM Version: IM71.007A.B03
SMC Version (system): 1.20f4
I don't know if this will help my question/s, but now you know what I have.
So question # 1: my emails that I try to delete from my inbox merely 'change colour' in their text...then just sit there. I can't even rag them to the trash... Any ideas?
P.S. Sorry; I had posted up a bigger problem (startup disc stuff...) in here just before: I'll re-ask that question separately in a little bit...

Hello LTS. To do this I enabled right click on my magic mouse. I think this is done through system settings>mouse. It shows you how to do this and I have also found that there is a clip on you tube for almost any question I have.

Once I did this, I selected the message that I wanted to delete, right clicked and chose delete.

Sorry if it is a bit simplistic, I am a new user myself. Hope it helps.

Cheers

Phil F

You don't have to right click (though you can if you like). Simply selecting a given email and then pressing the delete key will have the same effect.

Even better. I always have to go about it the long way around.

Always learning.

Cheers

Phil F

Thanks gents, but neither fix seems to work on my system(!). The message still stays in the same place, albeit in a lighter colour as mentioned before... Pretty frustrating, even if it's minor.

LTS Jayce said:

Thanks gents, but neither fix seems to work on my system(!). The message still stays in the same place, albeit in a lighter colour as mentioned before... Pretty frustrating, even if it's minor.

Click to expand...

Just a question..how many emails have you got in your inbox and trash.? .if it's gazillions then try deleting some/lots.

pendlewitch said:

Just a question..how many emails have you got in your inbox and trash.? .if it's gazillions then try deleting some/lots.

Click to expand...

No, tried that. I'm at about 150 emails all up, and regularly clean out the trash!

LTS Jayce said:

No, tried that. I'm at about 150 emails all up, and regularly clean out the trash!

Click to expand...

Good housekeeping there!

There is a command in the Mail toolbar at the top of the screen which may work;

Mail/Mailbox/Erase Deleted Items/All Accounts

Also, go to Mail/Preferences/Accounts/Mailbox Behaviours and check what settings you have with regards to Trash.

Is the tick box about moving deleted messages to the Trash Mailbox checked or unchecked?

Edit: You could also perhaps try rebuilding the Mailbox database in Mail/Mailbox/Rebuild

Both excellent suggestions, but we forgot to check if the OP is using POP or IMAP. That's always the place to start with these sorts of discussions.

You're right chas_m. In my eagerness to help I forgot the blinking obvious.

chas_m said:

Both excellent suggestions, but we forgot to check if the OP is using POP or IMAP. That's always the place to start with these sorts of discussions.

Click to expand...

Soooo....how do I check THAT? I genuinely have zero idea a/ how to do it and b/ what you even meant, LOL!

If you look at your account in the preferences, it will tell you.

(hint: if it's not iCloud, MobileMe, GMail or Yahoo IMAP, it's probably not IMAP).