I receive a text from someone but it has an e-mail address at top of message. When I reply and send , it gets returned. Why? and how was original message sent?

Question

I have downloaded I-Cloud and the new ios program. Where do my text go through now if they don't show up on my bill in the data usage section? When I get a text from friends sometime their e-mail address shows at the top of the message instead of their name like it use to. Then when I reply it gets returned. They tell me they are sending it through the normal text like they use to.

Answer 1

You are probably right - I don't have my iPad with me and was confusing myself.  But on the iPad it is receive at email addresses only.
Sending to the phone number will mean ONLY your iPhone gets the message.  If you want it to go to ALL devices, then you should have them send to the email address associated with the AppleID you used to set up iMessage originally.  Also set that email address up as your caller id on the iPhone so as you send out messages, people will reply to that and both your devices should get them.
Although Apple's notes indicate you should be able to do it - http://support.apple.com/kb/TS2755
what if you just type in a 10-digit phone number on the iPad instead of an email?
(I originally did all this with iOS 5.0, and I know then the number did not work on an iPad, but maybe with iOS 5 updates, it does now?)