I just disabled visual effects and the buddy list reverted to normal behavior. Upon setting Perferences->Appearance->Visual Effects to Normal the buddy list still worked. The only other thing I had set was the Wallpaper plugin in CompizConfig Settings Manager. Not sure how the bug was resolved, but it is something worth trying if you are having issues.
I just disabled visual effects and the buddy list reverted to normal behavior. Upon setting Perferences- >Appearance- >Visual Effects to Normal the buddy list still worked. The only other thing I had set was the Wallpaper plugin in CompizConfig Settings Manager. Not sure how the bug was resolved, but it is something worth trying if you are having issues.