About a month ago I switched to Linux mint from windows 11.
The first thing I noticed was mint being faster and less bloated than windows 11.
I also liked having actual control over my settings without a corporation being able to undo them at will.
Another thing I noticed was not having to add extensions to text files to run as a program instead having the option in properties.
For certain windows programs and games I was able to use wine which was great because I like to use gamemaker 8.1 which was made before they added linux support.
I tried different wine environments starting with bottles then trying Steam proton and Lutris. With Lutris being the one I ended up using due to it being the only one that I could get to run every program I needed.
The ms paint alternative called drawing took some use to due to it automatically cropping out parts of the image outside of the line when pasting in a screenshot from the clipboard.
Although I do still miss ms paint but that is mostly nostalgia.
Fortunately there is an option to save the screenshot after taking it.
Migrating from windows I appreciate the SUPER key bringing up a menu on the bottom left which brings up some apps and the search bar. Which always searches on the OS unlike windows 11 which sometimes searches the internet instead.
Another detail I noticed is if you type paint or notepad in the search it brings up drawing and the text editor which is nice for people transitioning to Linux.
Being able to move the panel or add new ones was also a breath of fresh air from windows 11 making the task bar more restrictive.
Having the option of deb packages and flatpacks is really useful as well.
I also no longer have to worry about telemetry or microsoft trying to show me ads or pop ups.
TL:DR Mint is a way better experience than windows 11.
I'll mostly share tips regarding what you said, OK?
Quite a few programs still rely on files in ~/.config/. So if you feel like the options in a program are "missing", give its config file a check. (To see hidden directories: Ctrl+H)
There's another MS Paint alternative called Kolourpaint. I personally prefer it over Drawing; once you install it you'll need to install quite a bit of stuff from the KDE environment, but I think that it's worth.
The super key can be configured to your taste. For example mine brings up composing, so if I type Super+e+1 I get ɛ, Super+a+1 I get ɐ, so goes on. (I open the menu with Alt+F1, by the way.) As implied, as a further tip - if you need certain characters you can create custom keystrokes through a file called .XCompose.
To expand on this some if you're more of a visual person:
If you open the keyboard application, (just called "keyboard" when you do a search in your applications.) the second tab is "Shortcuts". From there you can see an interface that shows and helps you change all the shortcuts on the system.
You can use the search feature to narrow things down quickly. The multiple "screenshot" shortcuts were nice to find for some common use cases I do.