Lefthandman,
I'd wager your attempting to increase your mining skill. I've discovered that the simple act of mining itself increased my skills.
To get the ability to mine Iron, I simply spend a hour of time in the Gold Coast quarry in Westfall. At the quarry I found Tin viens, silver and Copper. Although it was a grinding experience, I was ok with that. In the one hour I went from a 118 skill in Mining to 125 the min requirement to start mining Iron.