Lookup on Dropdown presents ID Number not String Value

I know this has been addressed in at least these two posts:

https://help.zoho.com/portal/en/community/topic/how-to-get-result-string-from-lookup

https://help.zoho.com/portal/en/community/topic/formula-field-displaying-long-id-instead-of-string-value

... but the offered answers don't seem to address/remedy my situation.

I have two forms: Agents and Agency. Agents has a dropdown that lets you select available Agencies. Using the following code in the Agents form under Field Actions>Agency>On User Input, the Agency contact information fields pre-populate on the Agent form.

if(Agency[ID == input.Agency].count() > 0)

{

x = Agency[ID == input.Agency];

//input. refers to fields in current form

input.Agent_Street = x.Agency_Street;

input.Agent_City = x.Agency_City;

input.Agent_Province = x.Agency_Province;

input.Agent_Postal_Code = x.Agency_Postal_Code;

}

All worked well when I had Agency_Postal_Code set up as a single line text field. To minimize user entry errors, I changed Agency_Postal_Code to a dropdown that provided a defined list of two-letter abbreviations for the provinces and states.

The instant I did that, the pre-populated Agent_Postal_Code field became a long ID number, rather than the assigned two-letter state/province abbreviation.

Ideas on how to get the string value back?