Hello 'nikkidelia2',
New to ebay? Excellent! Welcome! Nice to have you along! 
And you lost a bid. Until we get the hang of it, most of us lose out to a last-second sniper,
or even our own thick fat fingers not being as fast as we anticipated.
The best "how to bid" information you will get anywhere is ebay's own explanation page,
written in plain simple language that only takes a couple minutes to read.
This one about automatic bidding even has a little diagram:
http://pages.ebay.ca/help/buy/automatic-bidding.html
On the right is this one about bid increments, -- that's really important to know because if you
are not familiar with ebay auctions, how the amounts go up can seem confusing at first:
http://pages.ebay.ca/help/buy/bid-increments.html#how
And this one, of course, about getting outbid, and how not to get outsniped in the last few
minutes:
http://pages.ebay.ca/help/buy/outbid.html
The reason that ebay has people place a bid, and then in a second window confirm that bid,
is so that users will be absolutely sure they really truly mean it.
It's surprisingly easy to contemplate entering a bid, type the numbers, and if your mouse is
hovering over the Bid button ..., -- imagine if you entered that bid when you had not yet fully committed?
The two-step process prevents you from entering a bid and then having to pay for an item when
you were still in the 'thinking about it' stage.
Now you know. When you are in the last hour of an auction, in that second 'confirmation' window
that pops up you will see the countdown by minute and second displayed in a deep orange colour.
It's super easy that way.
So when you're in the last few minutes of the auction, -
Beside the item you type the amount and click Place bid. Then you watch the countdown, poised over
that Confirm button ready to strike, and when you're ready, . . . Zot! You'll never lose out again.
Happy shopping! 
