Rick-
As I've explained over and over again, for some reason on this mailing list (and almost exclusively on this list), Yahoo forces me to top post. I hate it -- I consider it bad form. Other things that are sent to me don't have this problem. But if I post inside or below the post I'm responding to, it creates a ">" next to the line I'm typing, making it look as if it's part of the post I'm responding to. This is the only way I have of making my posting stand out from the rest of what I'm responding to.
Have you looked at http://yahoopops.sourceforge.net/ ? It provides a POP3 interface to Yahoo mail. That means that you can use any regular email client to access your mailbox. I haven't tested it, but lots of people seem to be using it, so I presume it works. Note that you can configure any good email client to not delete messages on the server, so you can still use the webmail interface in addition to a client.
There are other scripts like fetchyahoo which just store the mail in a local mailbox file that can only be read by some clients.
Lastly, there's the option of using Yahoo's pay service ($30/year), which includes POP3 access. Seems like a reasonably good offer.
Regards,
Erik