amy at least be proud that you took the initiative to try something. most ppl dont even try.
i would definitely recommend reading through the forum more. there are a lot of great tips to get you going. through reading through this site you will get a lot more ideas on what you can try to make some money (list building, ppc->cpa, ppc->cpc arbitrage, affiliate marketing, virtual products/ebooks, vre/sites, ect).
earning money from adsense isnt easy especially if you are trying to do it with organic traffic and not ppc.
to get into adsense just create a family friendly site and reapply. they will accept you this time.
btw you dont need to learn html right away if you want to use a html editor to double check your code.
good luck