IPhoto won't open after a reinstall.....

Question

You'll have to excuse my lack of specific Mac details, as I'm relatively new on the system. I've got a Mac mini, had it for about 8 months, and the system froze up and would not restart. I talked to an associate in an Apple store, told me to reinstall the discs, holding down ctrl C, i believe. (some function button and "c"). Everything was reinstalled with no glitches, with the exception of iPhoto.
It is present in the finder, although the icon has changed to the general application icon of the pencil, paintbrush, and ruler formed A. When I double click on it, it opens up briefly in the toolbar, but then disappears. everytime I do this, it repeats. I can open up the photos in iPhoto in a preview screen, but nothing within iPhoto. I've tried repairing the disc utilities. I've tried dragging it down to the toolbar, which when I do this, it stays, but won't open anything.
Sorry for my wordiness. Just trying to describe as much as possible, due to my lack of mac savviness.
Thanks for any help or suggestions.
Mini    

Answer 1

I ran disk utility as it was restarting.
I can't imagine what this means. Disk Utility can't run until the computer has started.
After it is completed, it tells me that 1HFS volume checked, No repiars were necessary.
Good — that's what you want to see.
Should I run the verify disk option now...
Verifying the disk is pointless, now and always, since it carries out the same diagnostic tests as the Repair Disk function, but doesn't repair anything that it finds to be out of order.
...or just let the restart resume?
Again, I can't imagine what you mean by this. When you quit Disk Utility, you are returned to the Installer. If you quit the installer, your computer restarts. I don't see how you could possibly have interrupted the restart and then performed any other operation.