Dear Olivia:
I am sorry to hear this. I can tell you personally that you really can get a lot out of attending the APM training to take full advantage of the solution. We do document a lot in Videos, the official documentation, and the 30-60 Knowledge Documents released each month. But the training provides a good framework to build on.
Do review the above sources to assist in your education. Many answers can be found therein.
>Here in Brazil things are a bit complicated, we do not have training, so we have to run to forums .. to you!