I guess that I might be one of the few folks Kevin who really like PS. I have done work in the gaming world with it (making skins for aircraft, buildings, and vehicles) and then started to use it for photo editing.
I would recommend what Stacey said, as well as looking at your local book store (alah Barnes and Nobel or Hastings) and look in the photography section for some "How to" or Dummy books. That is how I started learning about layers, lighting features, masking, etc.
Good Luck.
Craig
Somewhere up in NoCo