Yairsss ... welll ... ummmm.... There's a hole in my logic. And in my $%^^&* head
I have now discovered that my solution worked only because of a certain set of circumstances that existed when I did it, but no longer exist now - I won't bore you with another long post to explain.
It looks like
fobotsco's method is the go - should have listened to an expert rather than try to reinvent the wheel.
If little Billy's boys 'n' girls would build some smarts into OE's import messages function so that existing messages were not duplicated (as per the import address book function), all would be well.
I will invite him to cocktails and suggest same.
Hope springs eternal in the human breast.
AA