Caught in the night garden

My first attempt at stars photography is a bit of a disaster - it suddenly seems quite complicated. After a few dismal shots I decided to follow someone's advice and have a test exposure for 30 secs at short focal length & wide aperture.
Thought I'd try light painting a tree while I was there, only to find myself in the pic - and I had accidentally flashed my torch in the direction of the camera.
A steep learning curve but I'll try again when we have another clear night to see if I can actually catch some stars with a foreground interest. A trip into the country looks to be fairly essential to remove extraneous light, but it might be interesting.