Your Virgin Media Mail account is currently unavailable

I have had an ntlworld.com email account for many years and until Tuesday night was able to access it on each of my four platforms: using Windows Live Mail on a PC; using Windows Live Mail on an iMac; on an iPhone; and on an iPad - oh, and also by signing in to My Virgin Media/ Virgin Media Mail.  Since Wednesday morning I have been unable to access any of them.  The initial messages were that I needed to enter a password despite the fact that all had been operating successfully for years with the password that had been saved on each.  When accessing My Virgin Media, I received the message that "Your Virgin Media Mail account is currently unavailable" with a three step process to supposedly rectify the issue.  Step 1, changing my My Virgin Media password and the default account to a non Virgin Media (hotmail) account, was accomplished.  Step 2 was then to change my Virgin Media Mail password and I followed the steps (which have been posted elsewhere in this forum as a solution) - My Virgin Media/Account Settings/Account Details/Manage Your Virgin Media Mail - and repeatedly received the message "Oops, looks like something's gone wrong on our side.  Please try again." However, trying again only takes me around the circle again.  I've read the various similar posts on here but can't find anything that works.  It has been five days now with no access to my email and I have no idea what I could be missing.  Help would be very much appreciated.