No talent in this post

I admire those folks who understand and use those Photoshop programs. I have Paint Shop Pro and clearly don't get it. I try to use it, but ultimately really screw up the picture, get frustrated, and then just use the original - afterall, by that point the original looks pretty good after seeing the "improvements" I made.
Case in point: these two photos from today. I had to crop both of them (clearly my only talent when it comes to this stuff). Then I tried to lighten them. Do you think I could get poor Jenna to look the same color in both of them? Nope.