I would invoke virtue #2, laziness and ask why your data structure can't look like this: 
my %email = {
  Category1 => { "Name One",  'some1@address.com },
  Category2 => { "Name Two",  'some2@address.com',
                 "Name Three", 'some3@address.com },
  "Name One" => 'some1@address.com'
}

[download]
You see, the hash does not have to homogenous. When you do a lookup, either key the Category names so they're easily distinguishable (all caps, put a * in front) as a string or check to see whether the value of your hash key is a reference. If it is, dereference and lookup again. Or better yet, realize that what you really want is a hash of arrays, where when you provide a name you want one or more email addresses back. Note that you never return "Name One", only 'some1@address'. Try organizing like this: 
my %Email = {
  'Category1' => [ q(some1@address.com) ],
  'Category2' => [ q(some2@address.com some3@address.com) ],
  'Name One'  => [ q(some1@address.com) ]
};

[download]

In reply to Re: Complex Hash by Anonymous Monk
in thread Complex Hash by Adam

Title:
Use:  <p> text here (a paragraph) </p>
and:  <code> code here </code>
to format your post, it's "PerlMonks-approved HTML":


  • Posts are HTML formatted. Put <p> </p> tags around your paragraphs. Put <code> </code> tags around your code and data!
  • Titles consisting of a single word are discouraged, and in most cases are disallowed outright.
  • Read Where should I post X? if you're not absolutely sure you're posting in the right place.
  • Please read these before you post! —
  • Posts may use any of the Perl Monks Approved HTML tags:
    a, abbr, b, big, blockquote, br, caption, center, col, colgroup, dd, del, details, div, dl, dt, em, font, h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6, hr, i, ins, li, ol, p, pre, readmore, small, span, spoiler, strike, strong, sub, summary, sup, table, tbody, td, tfoot, th, thead, tr, tt, u, ul, wbr
  • You may need to use entities for some characters, as follows. (Exception: Within code tags, you can put the characters literally.)
            For:     Use:
    & &amp;
    < &lt;
    > &gt;
    [ &#91;
    ] &#93;
  • Link using PerlMonks shortcuts! What shortcuts can I use for linking?
  • See Writeup Formatting Tips and other pages linked from there for more info.