[Xymon] Can't match alerts.cfg rules

[Jake]

I have 4.3.27-1.el7.terabithia running on Centos 7, and can't get any
rules in alerts.cfg.to match and fire an alert. 

I have in hosts.cfg: 

192.168.2.31 phone-sales # conn 

In alerts.cfg: 

 HOST=phone-sales COLOR=red
 MAIL somebody at gmail.com
## Wildcard rule
 HOST=%^.*$ COLOR=red
 MAIL somebody at gmail.com 

Made the wildcard rule a regexp because "HOST=*" wasn't working, and
added the host-specific rule because no wildcard was working. But if I
trigger a red on host phone-sales, in alert.log I see: 

Checking criteria for host 'phone-sales', which is not yet defined; some
alerts may not immediately fire 

What am I missing? I retired a year and a half ago, and have been out of
practice, so feel free to start with "You dummy...." 
 
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