"can someone tell me what the whole point of an IMAP account is?"
If your emails are important to you, like if there is any reason at all why you want to keep certain emails for years and years, even as you change computers and add/subtract devices, IMAP is critical, because with POP, you have to physically move those important emails from the old computer to the new one and it is a huge pain in the rear. Plus, only with IMAP can you access your emails from multiple devices. POP means each email is like a physical thing that resides only in one place. I think of POP emails as golf balls arriving at my computer through a physical tube. Once the ball drops into my computer, that's where it is, period. It is nowhere else. There are no backups.
Each person is different, of course. Maybe you don't need to save important emails for years. But I definitely do, so for me, IMAP is absolutely essential.
Hope this helps.
