Thunderbird Printing problems

[squareyes]

Hi all,
am having problems printing out emails from Thunderbird.
Printer is HP Laserjet 1100, works fine from OpenOffice, gedit etc.
Will not print from the "print" in the file menu, and only sometimes will
it print from the "print" icon.When clicking on either it shows that it 
is printing,
but does not show any print dialog, only shuts down Thunderbird.
Does anyone have any ideas as to what I am doing wrong?
Thanks in advance,
Take Care,
Winton