evolution will not transfer complete address from contact book to address line on new messages although the contact entries all seem to be correct,and also deletes address line while you write message an some occassions

although the entries in my contact list in evolution are formated correctly some addresses transfer to the address line on a new message correctly while others only transfer partially. on other occasions the address line has disappeared while i type the message. i manually entered the contact list as i could not find a way to get evolution to read my thunderbird adbook.mab file. should i delete the whole contact list and re-enter or does any one know a better way?