Remember above all : a reference is a scalar value, so reference it as you would a string (e.g.) -- as long as you remember it's pointing to something, instead of containing the value you want. Since you want to set it to a hashref:

So:

$hash{key1}{1} = \%copy;
[download]

should do ya.

Philosophy can be made out of anything. Or less -- Jerry A. Fodor