Additionally from FunkyMonk's answer, you may also want to put some checking to see if supplied name doesn't exist in %numbers to avoid unitialized warning. 
print "Who's number are you looking for? : \n";
chomp(my $who = <STDIN>);
my $number = $numbers{$who} || 'unknown';
print "$who number is $number\n";

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In reply to Re: user defined variable as hash key index by naikonta
in thread user defined variable as hash key index by pleasehelp

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