Vi is a text editor for serious text editing, it takes some getting used to but is chock full of powerful features. Pico is designed for people who occasionally log into a UNIX machine to check mail or something (its origins are in Pine, which is an email client for UNIX newbies). As a programmer you spend all day editing text, so it's definitely worth putting in the effort to learn how to use a good text editor.

After a decade of regular use I'm only an intermediate vim user, but what I know so far really helps with my productivity.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=vim%20tutorial