Tutorial problem

I hope I am in the right section and someone has not asked this already. I could not find one. I am running Vista (can't remember which) and I am having problems with the tutorials included. The first one I run I really can't use. The text is cut off on the left and is often unreadable. I have tried several resolutions, in cluding both extremes. I have downloaded the latest patch. Nothing works. The places where I totally cannot figure out what the tutorial is saying the manual does not help either. It is more than one thing too, so asking for help on just one thing is not an option. I may have to just play around and either miss out on a lot and/or get killed a lot. This is not good. Any help on this is appreciated.