Close, but grep returns a list, not a scalar. Forcing the return value in a scalar, as you do, will get you the number of elements in it, or in your case the number of elements starting with 1006. Also, you might look into split to get to the second field in the element:

print (split /,/,$_)[1] for grep /^1006/, @array; #UNTESTED
[download]

As a better solution for this problem, consider using a hash instead of an array to store your data (that is, if the first field in your data is unique). Hashes are built for fast text searches:

use strict;
my %hash=qw(1001 choochoo 1002 candycane 1003 sockpuppet);
print $hash{'1003'};
__END__
sockpuppet
[download]

CU
Robartes-

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