It's all about what you prefer. Paint isn't great, but some people can make amazing images with it, But for free programs I recommend Gimp, considering photoshop costs money (I think they all do, I have elements 6.0)
If you're not up to buying the more complex programs, try making something in paint and editing it in GIMP. I got some good results that way (Not entirely sure why it doesn't look as good if I just use GIMP, though. >_>.