iMessage turned off and i get e-mails instead of texts?

[arlan]

Sorry if this is a noob question.
Normally i chat with this person via imessage but i turned it off for the night. Then i check my e-mail seeing i get an e-mail from his number looking like this #########@mms.att.com. I'm assuming that was meant to be as a imessage messages or text messages? Why did i not receive it on my phone and why did it send via e-mail instead?

 

[Leo]

Because you have your e-mail address set as default for iMessage, or that's what he has saved on his phone to iMessage you. When you turned off iMessage, his phone was unable to send that iMessage, so it instead turned it into an MMS to your e-mail address. If he had your phone number, and you used that for iMessage, it would have gone through as a regular SMS instead.

I hope that answers your question.