[Yum] using yum for the first time

[drussi]

Hello

Was hoping to get some help with uing yum. I am new to linux and have 
only had a weeks experience and using yum is one thing I am having 
trouble with. I cant seem to get it running and really want to get all 
the updates to see if it is either me or my machine lacking the files 
needed to get other things I am try to get going going. I start the 
konsole shell and try the following command:

> [drussi at localhost drussi]$ yum list


and this is what I get after it:

> Gathering package information from servers
> Getting headers from: Yellow Dog Linux 3.0 base
> Traceback (most recent call last):
>   File "/usr/bin/yum", line 44, in ?
>     yummain.main(sys.argv[1:])
>   File "yummain.py", line 141, in main
>   File "clientStuff.py", line 643, in get_package_info_from_servers
> OSError: [Errno 13] Permission denied: '/var/cache/yum/base'
> [drussi at localhost drussi]$

Has anybody ever experienced this. Can anyone help me out to get it 
runnning I am really hanging and have no idea why I get the last line 
before the prompt returns for me to try again to get yum working and end 
up with the same result.

Thanks.