Manually typed emoticons not displaying as image in Messenger

For a long time now on my DTEK50, any emoticons which are typed up manually within Messenger (i.e. ":-)") will not display as an image. The same goes for anything I send, or messages I receive from others (ones where they type the emoticon manually).

However, if I select an emoticon from Messenger's pallet of emoticons, it displays as expected. And when someone sends an emoticon which was selected the same way from their end, it also shows fine.

This is driving me a little nuts. There's a lot of threads out there referencing similar issues, and some people claim the issue is fixed when you set the option for "Use Simple Characters" to off. I've set it to off and on, and it doesn't resolve the issue. So at this point, I'm not sure if the manually typed emoticons showing up as regular characters is by design, or if it's some kind of bug.

I would love to hear some feedback from others on this. Would you kind people who are using the PRIV/DTEK50/60 (and non-BlackBerry devices too) please check your device and let me know if you are experiencing the same behavior?

As the OS is Android, try the setting described at the link and quote below.
The poster was describing a way to turn off emojis, I would say yours may already be off and turning it on will solve the issue:

How to disable smileys in text messages? - Android Forums at AndroidCentral.com

"Open the message app, then back out of any open text message until you get to the message history list. Open the menu from the top-left icon, scroll down and select "Settings." There should be an option titled "Enable Smart Emojis." Turn that off and hopefully this fixes your problem."

Sorry for the late response. I did check, but I don't see that flow of options on Android MM. And I don't see "Enable Smart Emojis" anywhere either.

I am starting to suspect that the behavior I descried is by design. Everything else seems to work fine.