My darling mother called me last week for some technical support, so of course I put everything on my desk aside to help her.
She was exploring Outlook Express when all of a sudden her address book disappeared! I helped her get it back by selecting "View" from the very top menu bar, then "Layout".
Once there, all she had to do was activate the Contacts option.
She thought she had accidentally deleted her address book. Thankfully, only the contacts pane, which displays the address book contents, was disabled.