I tried uninstalling Telegram on my laptop, and afterward eopkg info telegram
said it wasn't installed. And it's not in the Internet menu anymore. But when I reinstalled it, it displayed the same UI as it's had since Sunday. It lists the conversations on the left side, along with that wait cursor, and "Connecting ..." but it doesn't.
I'm now wondering if that means it's trying to connect with my phone, as that seems to be where its connection with the Internet actually happens. But I can't figure out why that doesn't work, since Telegram works just fine on the phone.
When I originally installed this, I had to tell it to connect with my phone. I'd like to get to that point once more.