Yes, perhaps I shouldn't have gone with just nested arrays/arrayrefs :)

Here's a modified example where it's not as clear how to deref.

Like:

  @IP = ('192.168.1.10','192.168.1.15');
  @PORT = ("5000","5002");
  @TCP = ("Q931","H225","H245");
  %TAGS = (L2 =>"ETHERNET",L3=>"IP",L4=>\@TCP);
  @PKT = ( \@IP, \@PORT, \%TAGS);
  $array_ref=\@PKT;
  print $array_ref->[2]{L4}[0];# this works
  print $$array_ref[2]{L4}[0]; # this works
  print $array_ref[2]{L4}[0];  # this doesn't