Welcome to the message boards Beginners Luck. Please don't feel you have to apologize, your post is just fine.
You can always farm certain bosses that drop good non auction gear that your particular pirate will be able to use. Although to be honest I wouldn't worry about leveling too much. We all seem to run into the same problem when we get close to the current end of the game and await new expansions. Our level gets to the current cap and our experience that is normally gained to finish the story plot is lost. We lose a huge advantage of XP by giving it away just to finish the story even when our level is capped. Currently having too much level is the problem so in the long run you are doing just fine doing the quests and side quests as written.
Have fun and I hope on of my Chrissy's see you in the skyway.