Windows 7: Windows live mail - lost contacts

I think I posted this to the wrong part of the forum so I am reposting
Hi,
I have been using Windows Live Mail on this computer for 5 months or more with no issues. Today, out of nowhere, all contacts, safe sender and blocked senders were gone. I never had to actually sign into my Live Mail account, but today, it prompted me to get a hotmail account so I could log into Live Mail.
I have no need for a hot mail or yahoo account as I already have email through Hughes,net, but after I signed up for a hot mail account, it automatically signs into my LIVE MAIL account also. I had to re-input 150 contacts. What has changed?
I never needed to sign in before and I always had my contacts????

Thanks
Joe

WLM can be very confusing when it comes to contacts. There are two ways to use WLM (1)"signed-in" and (2)"not signed-in". Each has its own contact list. You may have been signing in automatically all the time using the same LiveID that you used when you originally downloaded WLM. (You couldn't download WLM in the first place without a LiveID.) If you again sign in with the LiveID with which you were previously signing in automatically you will again see that "signed-in" contact list.

If OTOH you really were optioned to "never sign in" (Options/Connections Tab) then you were always using the "Not signed-in" contact list. You will see that list again if you do not sign in. I'm not sure which is the case.

WLM can actually be used with multiple LiveIDs and each one will show its own contact list.

Well, this is what is weird.
I NEVER HAD A lIVE id, AND EVERYTIME i WOULD OPEN MY EMAIL, i WOULD SEE THE BOX IN THE UPPER RIGHT THAT SAYS 'SIGN IN", SO i GUESS i WAS NEVER SIGNING IN.
Sorry for the "caps".
So, if I was never signing in, where did the contacts go?
I tried to check the box that says "don't sign in", and still no contacts. I had to actually create a windows lived hotmail ID, then reinpout all my contacts.
Don't know what to do

Apparently you were using the "not-signed-in list". You might try looking at the shutdown menu and click on the "switch user" option. If you happen to have more then one icon (user) you could try clicking on a different one than you are currently using. Maybe that users WLM "not-singned-in" list is the one you were using previously.

BTW, if you never had a Window Live ID, someone else may have installed WLM for you since it does not come with Windows 7.

I had the same exact problem after WLM 2011 upgrade. Signing out did it and suddenly all my contacts appeared. I guess I was never signing in before but now by default it is possibly doing that automatically using my hotmail or MSN passport account??? Seems like a big change in the 2011 version that's going to affect a lot of people. I was only using WLM 2010 because there was no alternative to Outlook Express in Windows 7 for my Roadrunner email. Anyway, thanks for the hint. I hope it stays that way (signed out) now by default.

I'm not sure about 2011 but 2009 has an option (in the connections tab) to "stop signing in". Keep in mind that if you don't sign in your contacts will not be backed up on Microsoft's contacts.live.com website. So you may want to back them up manually. While there is a contacts import/export feature that you can use for backups, it only preserves the contacts themselves, not the folders which you used to organize them into groups or "categories". To preserve the category folder structure you may want to follow the procedure I posted here: WLive Mail 2011 lost my Contacts