Is your account POP or IMAP? If it's POP, you only see the Inbox from the mail server, not all the other folders including Spam. Messages sent to Spam are filtered by the mail provider before being downloaded to TB. Change to IMAP or access the Spam folder through webmail and move your friends' messages to Inbox.

Thank you sfhowes for your quick response. I have two email accounts, one with gmail the other with Spintel. I'm quite familiar with the process of logging into my webmail account with Spintel to view junk mail but have no idea how to do this with gmail. To view the junk folder in gmail I've followed various suggestions like view the pane on the LHS of my screen for the junk folder and if not there click on the "more" link to find it ... there is no "more" link. Another suggestion was to click the gear icon at the top RHS to find and load the junk folder ... there is no gear icon just the 3 bars to open the TB menu and when I do there's no reference to any junk folder. So I guess now my question is "how do I log onto the gmail server (if this is possible) to find the junk folder as I do with Spintel?". I'm anxious to get this done as I'm being told by friends that they have sent mail that I don't receive and we suspect they've been diverted to junk.

If you access your account on the gmail website, the Spam folder is definitely available (see picture). If the account is setup as IMAP in TB, right-click the account in the Folder Pane, Subscribe, click Refresh, and check the box for Spam.

Thank you sfhowes, that's very helpful. Now I know where to look. Much appreciated :)