In Paris and cannot get bb to work on wifi

Newbie and first time poster :D

Have an unlocked BB Bold 9700 which have always used in NYC (ATT) and am in Paris for a couple of months,currently using a local payg sim card without a internet (data) plan and for some reason ever since getting here i cant even get bb to work using my home wifi...i've been thru all the posts and i think its down to fact that my host routing table is empty (?) and altho ive sent requests its not populated...so basically i get the greyed out wifi symbol and (-) next to the name

i've read that u "need" a data plan for wifi to work...but doesn't that defeat the purpose of a phone even having wifi in first place?

thank you

(NB when i was in japan for a week...bb/bbm worked fine over wifi...granted my ATT sim card was still in but mobile network deactivated, was the actual sim change a factor)

THE HRT is associated with the ACTIVE Blackberry enabled plan. Your ATT SIM will be what delivers or indicates to RIM that you have an active data enabled plan.

And yes, the sim change was the culprit.