You are not the only one...
OHOn Chrome Mobile, HTML input is a toggle in the reply toolbar ribbon with the brackets icon [ ]. It disables smileys and inline pics in responses. Drove me nuts for longer than I want to admit. It may be a (persistently stored) toggle in other browsers as well. Just putting that out there while folks are looking into such things.
Seriously? Did that do it? Hot damn, it's true what they say about this broken clock!OH
MY
GOD!
You’re a genius!