Thunderbird is free email client software. Email providers issue email accounts and that is not Thunderbird. Gmail, Yahoo and several others are free email providers. Establish an account with one of them and then use Thunderbird to help manage that account.

As part of your evaluation you might want to study the difference between email client software and an email provider.

Hi Airmail: Thanx for the quick response and very helpful suggestion abt difference between client software and provider. But my confusion started when i tried to create a new acct while downloading TB. Apparently a biz arrangement with "Gandi" allows an acct creation for a fee which makes me think that it may be possible to create an acct unique to TB without a corresponding provider acct.

Also this appears on TB website -

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Personalized Email Addresses:

"Ever dreamed of having a personalized email address (such as "dad@thesmithfamily.com") for you, your family or your business? Thunderbird makes this easy - you can sign up for a new email address within Thunderbird, and it will all be set up automatically for you ready to send and receive."

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What don't i understand ??

Bewildered Bob

Yes you can sign up for a new email address.... with gandi.... for a fee. The page you quote says nothing about free does it. Nor does it say Thunderbird provides the account, only that you can sign up for one from within Thunderbird.

Or you can create one at Google or Yahoo or GMX or one of the many other free email providers and use that as airmail suggested. That is for Free.

There are no "unique" to Thunderbird accounts. I sure would not spend money on a Gandi account. They are just a vendor that Thunderbird has allowed access to push their product. Thunderbird, like all clients, does not care where you get your email service from.