(This applies to PSUVM netnews:)
 
Our NETNEWS is subscribed to those lists, and a few hundred more :)
and I haven't had your problem. I assume that you added the group
to the netnews (it should be bit.listserv.listname) and did not forget
to tell it that it's moderated by listname@listnode..
 
If your mailer or the listserv 1.6 is changing the filename of the
spool file (it has to be  listname MAIL), that may be causing the
problem..
 
Also, it takes a while to start receiving mail from lists - maybe it
was the delay that confused you?   Regards, -turgut