Hi Rocky651 , and welcome on this forum.
Vin_sun and eric already gave you all the explanations for entering your licence key on your forum profile
Let me inform you that there's a french section on this forum - if you want to talk with french people, that might interest you
About the different bugs you encountered, did you update the game to the latest available version ? You can check your version by going in Options, from the main menu. The version will then be displayed in the lower left corner of your screen. If you have a version below 1.2.2, please update your game (you can download the 1.2.2 update from http://www.shipsim.com/downloads/updates ). A 1.3 update is planned for release soon, but no date has been given yet.
You should be able to use your throttle and your stick with the game, but only two controllers are recognized by the game. If more than two controllers are connected to your computer, please disconnect those you don't want to use in ship simulator before running the game. You should them be able to use your two joysticks (if you set up correctly your controls from the Options menu).
I hope you'll enjoy the game as much I do !
regards,
Denis