@ soft skeletons.
I was a CS5 user for a few years and recently bought myself CS6 a few months ago. I
love it. I use it to make gifs, banners, icons, ect and it's perfect. I'm also on a Mac, so I believe it was just Elements that wasn't letting you do it. ( I never had it so I can't be sure. ) I'm changing my major to Web Development and Graphic Design and it's loads of fun. ^^
@ Marinesister92
I suggest going to adobe's website and downloading a free trial of Photoshop CS6 (regular, not extended) to see if it would be the right program for you. If it is, you should be able to buy a product key from the website with a student discount to keep it going. Any of the Photoshop CS editions should be great for making banners and icons. If the price is still too steep for what your use of it, you can always use
pixlr.com. It's free and extremely similar to Photoshop. Plus, it's all online so you don't need to worry about downloads.