It the attachment is a Word document, you must use the binary setting for downloading. A Word document should have a .doc extension. If it doesn't, change the name so that it does. Then try to read it in Word. But don't be surprised if it doesn't work or if your computer crashes.
Word documents made on one version of Word are often unreadable by other versions.
Other types of attachments follow the same principles. If you have one of these programs installed in Windows, you can just click on or start the file once you download it. If you use mail, rather than elm, save the message, download it as ascii, and then use the program called uudeview , which you must get. It is very easy. Then you can change the name, if needed, and read it into whatever application reads it.