Cracking guides

[Slon]

I looked at some of the cracking guides and decided to give them a try just for fun. However, a lot of them either don't work or they are designed for people experienced with cracking. Anyway, just for fun, I downloaded mIRC and installed it. As you know, the EXE file has a nag screen, which I read was recommended to cracking newbies. I decompiled in wdasm and opened in hex workshop and found some register "calls," but beyond that I am stuck since I don't understand some of the terminology used in the tutorials. I also don't understand the softICE link and how it relates to this. Is this some next step? Sorry of this is the wrong forum.