Capturing beautiful pictures can happen on most any camera, truly! Learn to use the equipment you have well before you invest another penny in a new lens/camera body/flash.
But once you have those photos you want some type of program to help you edit, even if it's just to crop, adjust colors or convert to black & white/sepia, or brighten. And there are so many options it can be intimidating, so I asked Kit (my tech support, among his many other talents!) These are the suggestions my husband offers for editing software and hosting sites for your galleries/videos:
Image editing
Free:
Windows only:
http://www.getpaint.net/
Cross Platform:
http://www.gimp.org/
Pay apps:
Mac:
http://www.pixelmator.com/ $30
Cross-Platform:
Photoshop Elements: $80
http://www.adobe.com/products/photoshop-elements.html
Lightroom *** Get this if you can afford it. $149
http://www.adobe.com/products/photoshop-lightroom.html
Online Galleries:
Flickr
Dropbox
Wordpress.com
Tumblr.com -- practically built for photo blogs
Once you feel like you've really become comfortable with your editing skills then you may find yourself limited by the software and it may be worth investing in a new program. But first learn to use what you have (or something free!) because you'll better know what specific features you want in your editing program. Just like with equipment - once I discovered my challenge was aperture related due to low light I knew what to look for (different lens) and was able to find the best deal to meet those needs without wasting money on more than I needed, or on something that wouldn't have fixed my issue.
And have fun! Photography can be intimidating in the vast amount of options and technical things to lear, but it's also about capturing moments and creating art. Have fun!