I'd suggest deleting and then re-adding your Hotmail account.
Here's info on adding it back:
Add an e-mail, newsgroup, or contacts directory account
If you have several e-mail or
newsgroup (An online bulletin board where messages are posted for public consumption and response.) accounts, including Windows Live Hotmail, MSN Hotmail, AOL, Gmail, and premium Yahoo! accounts, you can work with all of them in one window. Access to multiple accounts makes it easy for you to keep work and personal e-mail separate. You can also add
contacts directory (A shared online contact list that contains contact information about the people in a particular organization. Users with access to the directory the ability to find the e-mail address and other details of anyone in the directory. Usually accessed using the LDAP protocol.) accounts, which lets you extend your
contact list (A list of contacts that contains the names, addresses, phone numbers, and e-mail addresses of each of your contacts. If you're signed in with a Windows Live ID, Mail uses the contact list associated with your Windows Live ID.) to include all the members of an online directory.
Important
With most large e-mail providers, if you know your user name and password, Windows Live Mail can usually detect your account's settings and set up the new account automatically. However, when adding some accounts, you may need to get some account information from your
ISP (Internet service provider. A company that provides access to the Internet.) or network administrator and enter that information manually. The account information that you need is summarized in step 3.
To add an account:
- Start Mail.
Show me how
- In Windows XP, click Start, and then click Programs.
–or–
In Windows Vista, click Start, and then click All Programs.
- Click Windows Live, and then click Windows Live Mail.
- If you can't see the menu bar, in the upper-right corner of the screen, click the Menus button , and then click Show menu bar.
- On the menu bar, click the Tools menu, and then click Accounts.
- Click Add, and then do one of the following:
Click to expand: Add an e-mail account
- Click E-mail Account, and then click Next.
- Type your e-mail address, password, and display name. If the account that you want to add is a Windows Live Admin Center account, select the Manually configure server settings for e-mail account check box.
- Click Next.
- If you're adding a Windows Live Admin Center account, or if Mail can't detect your account's settings, in the Incoming Server Information and Outgoing Server Information sections, fill in the following information about your e-mail account, and then click Next. You may need to contact your ISP to find out some or all of the following information about your account:
- The type of e-mail server that you use (POP3 (Post Office Protocol 3. An e-mail protocol used to retrieve e-mail from a remote server over an Internet connection by e-mail providers such as Gmail.) , IMAP (Internet Message Access Protocol. An e-mail protocol that allows you to manage e-mail messages on a server. You can review headers, create or delete folders and messages, and search your e-mail remotely without downloading it. Used for e-mail accounts such as Microsoft Exchange.) , or HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol. A protocol used to transmit files over the Internet. Also used to send and receive web-based e-mail by accounts such as MSN Hotmail, Windows Live Hotmail, or Windows Live Admin Center.) ). For more information, see About e-mail protocols.
- The name and details of your incoming e-mail server. Your incoming server name might be mail.<domain>.com or pop.<domain>.com, where <domain> is the name of your e-mail provider's domain (A group of computers and devices on a network that are administered with common rules and procedures. The domain name is the part of your e-mail address after the @ sign, such as hotmail.com In a web address, the domain name usually follows www.) .
- Any relevant security settings.
- The name and details of your outgoing e-mail server (POP3 and IMAP accounts only). Your outgoing server name may be smtp.<domain>.com, where <domain> is the name of your e-mail provider's domain.
- Click Finish.
Add a newsgroup account
- Click Newsgroup Account, and then click Next.
- Type the name that you want to display when you post messages, and then click Next.
- Type an e-mail address where other newsgroup users can contact you, and then click Next.
- Type the name of the news server that you want to connect to, such as news.microsoft.com. If you have to provide a user name and password to log on to your news server, select the My news server requires me to log on check box.
- Click Next. If you selected the My news server requires me to log on check box, type your user name and password, and then click Next again.
- Click Finish.
Add a contacts directory account
- Click Contacts Directory Account, and then click Next.
- Type the name of the LDAP (Lightweight Directory Access Protocol. An Internet protocol used by e-mail programs to look up contact information on a server.) server that your ISP or network administrator has given you. If you have to provide a user name and password to log on to your LDAP server, select the This Contact directory requires me to log on with a name and password check box.
- Click Next. If you selected the This Contact directory requires me to log on with a name and password check box, type your account name and password, and then click Next again.
- Choose whether or not to let Mail use the contacts directory to check the e-mail addresses of your message recipients, and then click Next.
- Click Finish.
Notes
- To add multiple accounts for yourself, repeat the procedure above. Each e-mail and newsgroup account's folder structure appears in the folder pane (The left pane in the Windows Live Mail window, which contains the folder structure for all the e-mail accounts, newsgroup accounts, or RSS feeds that you've added. The folder pane also shows your Outbox and any offline storage folders on your computer's hard disk.) on the Mail tab or the Newsgroups tab . Mail isn't meant to be used by multiple users on a single Microsoft Windows user account.
- If Mail doesn't detect your account's settings automatically, or if you are an e-mail service provider with a large number of users that use Mail, you can also send us feedback asking us to add your e-mail service to the list of auto-detected providers.
- To set an account as the default, in the folder pane, right-click the account, and then click Set as default account.
- To access e-mail from a Gmail account by using Mail, you must change your Gmail settings to enable POP access. If you have a premium Yahoo! account, you can access e-mail from Yahoo! by using Mail.
