I'm completely new to Linux. I've googled but I can't find the keyboard shortcut command for this anywhere. I tried Ctrl-Alt-F3 from the graphical desktop, but it takes me to a login screen. Back on the desktop, I went to open bash through the GUI but it did nothing at all. This is so frustrating.
I'm running "Debian GNU/Linux 6.0.6 alias squeeze" inside VirtualBox for Windows, from here, and it has two sets of login details: http://virtualboxes.org/images/debian/
Also: I remember seeing someone pull-up the shell over a graphical desktop, almost like Alt-tabbing in Windows but with the text overlaid on the desktop with a semi-transparent black background. Is this possible for Debian?