Does this mean anything?

I'm mid-career, tenured at a SLAC, and mostly very happy with my current situation. However, my dream job at an R1 university opened up this year and I couldn't talk myself out of applying--in spite of the fact that, if the stars align and I'm offered the job, it will cause a lot of upheaval for my family. (To their credit, they seem perfectly okay with this prospect.)

The original job ad asked for cover letter and CV only; within a few weeks (even before the application deadline, actually) I was asked to send letters of rec. and the ms of my forthcoming book. I took this to mean I'd made some sort of first cut and was overjoyed. Last week, I received an email from the search committee chair telling me they hadn't received one of my letters. I quickly contacted the relevant person, hu sent an electronic copy for the short term and followed up with a hard copy, and the chair wrote back to thank me for the help in completing my file.

My question: does it mean something that the chair contacted me about this, or was hu just checking off boxes and making sure all files were complete? I'm thinking that since it wasn't an HR person, the completed file wasn't a university requirement; if it were, it seems like HR would be doing that grunt work. (When I was a grad student, departmental secretaries took care of this stuff. Actually, that's the case even here at my SLAC.) I'm also thinking that unless they're seriously interested in me, they wouldn't care whether I had all my letters of rec. in place to begin with. Is my thinking on track here?

This is mostly just a point of curiosity, not a crazy-making reading of the small details, since I'll be perfectly happy to stay where I am if things don't work out. But I'd be interested to hear the thoughts of those people who are running (or have run) searches at larger schools.

Thanks in advance for your input.

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