Error "You do not have an e-mail address" when trying to set SharePoint Alerts for some users

Really hoping that someone has at least an idea of where to start to look. I figure out that the people whose alerts DO work, were legacy employees, onboarded >2 years ago...Sharpoint alerts do not work for all "new" onboarded employees. I think there is something to that...

I was able to figure out how to get back to the "old" profile page (at this link: https://account.activedirectory.windowsazure.com/r/#/profile I just kept pasting the link and trying again in the same window and eventually it took me to the old profile page) and get a screenshot of the BLANK email address.

But when I go to the "new" My account page my email is listed. 

one thing that is interesting is that I already enabled the ability to edit the my account (as per the instructions in the above linked MS article. any help would be greatly appreciated. thx.