I'll try that, I've got a decent camera (Olympus SP-500UZ) but find the instructions baffling and tend to keep it on AF, I'm clueless about shutter speeds and white balance etc. Seem to get decent shots now and again and use the edit facility quite a lot. Having said that I'v just bought myself a pocket sized camera for £60 and seem to be getting decent shots from that too!
Giving a camera on auto works fine most of the time as long as the light is decent, but they do struggle badly at night time, even on the night setting (the little half moon symbol). With your Olympus, you should try it on S setting (shutter priority) which is like Auto but you have control over the Shutter speed. Depending on how dark it is or how much light is entering the frame, you could set the shutter on anything from 1/50th sec down to 1/10th sec and see how it goes. The great thing about digital camera is you can take shot after shot without it costing you anything, so you could try taking the same photo at a whole range of shutter speeds and see what works and what doesn't. It's the best way to learn.
I just bought (yet) another camera, a pocket sized Nikon S640 - its smaller than a packet of cigarettes but delivers pretty good photos, was £130:
