There is one other thing you need to consider between return a hash or hash-ref. Do you want the original data editable?
Look at this code:

sub hash {
        my $h = shift;
        return %$h;
}

sub href {
        my $h = shift;
        return $h;
}

my $n = { moo => 'blah', arrg => 'no' };
my %hash = hash($n);
$hash{arrg} = 'yes';
print join(' ',%$n) . "\n";
# Output: moo blah arrg no

my $m = { moo => 'blah', arrg => 'no' };
my $hash = href($m);
$hash->{arrg} = 'yes';
print join(' ',%$m) . "\n";
# Output: moo blah arrg yes
[download]

The first one is what you were doing originally, I don't know why it didn't work. But it is better to return a hash-ref unless you really need to protect the original data (which anyone can get to with $p->{buddys_list} anyway if they really want to).

---

---

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! —

• How do I compose an effective node title?
• How do I post a question effectively?
• Markup in the Monastery

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:
	&		&
	<		&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.