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talk dirty to me by poison

It depends on what you want to do with the songs. I improvise a lot of my leads so I have tons of fake books because they give the 3 basic elements of the song; chords, lyrics and melody. The ones where I want to reproduce what is on the record or cd, I pay a bit more for the transcription so that I have every lick in the song there in front of me.

a heavier gauge string should cure it

Since you are makeing power chords, you may as well learn to make full bar chords. After all a power chord is half of a bar chord anyway.

All of them are hard until you learn them, then they are easy.

i like to jam along with my willie dixon box set. I also picked up a few licks from buddy guy's damn right i got the blues and some of hendrix's stuff. bB king's song Lucille is full of little licks that are easy to pick up and are apropriate in almost any blues setting.

Gus,
Your stuff sounds all the same most likely because tit is all the same. It just takes time to learn different ways to play and develop a style all your own. Keep working at it and keep having fun! Also remember, you are a musician so nothing is off limits. you can jump in there and try any type of song you like. When I had been playing for eight months everything I played sonded like the Ramones before they had thier coffee in the morning. I wanted to sound different but I felt I could never play like whoever, When i finnaly jumped in and tried it turns out i was right. I still don't sound like slash or SRV but I developed new way to sound like me. By learnning new stuff it helped me develop a style all my own that is still very versitile.
  It will also help to jam with and learn from a variety of people. The more styles you work with the more you will pick up. Hang in there and you will see what I mean.

Merry Christmas I Don't Want To Fight Tonight by the Ramones!

I think you should first learn to  make barre chords (cause then you can make ANY chord by moving you hand up or down the neck or by liftin or adding a finger), learn a few movable scales (your hands are already in position when you make your barre chord) and learn your open chords which sound soooooo sweet on a 12 string.
That sounds like a lot but heres a good method:
1)Start with power chords useing the E, A and D strings. If it feels like a strain or an awkward stretch thats because it is. Don't worry, it will be second nature fairly soon.
2)While you are mastering that, start working on the minor scale it is easy and very versitile
3)As you are learning those 2 things, pick an open chord to learn. Practice making it until you can play it clear and clean with no buzz or muffled sounds (assuming the condition of you guitar doesn't cause those sounds.) Practice going from power chords to your open chord quickly and smoothly. As you learn each chord add another and another.
4)Once you have mastered step 1, make the same power chords on the A, D and G strings.
5)By now you should have your minor scale down pretty good. If not, it's ok keep working at it. Now you can add the major scale, also very simple and very versitile.
6)By this time you probably have some hand streangth, mobility, dexterity. You will need all theese thing because now we move to barre chords. Remember your power chords? geuss what? thats half of a barre chord. Just barre that finger accross all the strings (if you aren't allready) and add or lift your middle finger or pinky. Take your time and do it clean and smooth.
7)get in a band and show off your mad guitar skills! Don't forget to pick up little things from others on the way.

The ricks and hoffner that the beatles started with were in their hands because they were cheap instruments. Try to find a cheap rickenbacker now.