Different kind of stem, following a reference image loosely … Maybe the horizontal cylinder should not have been part of the stem? A bit hard to predict before knowing where the lessons will take us, but for now I have taken the parts where I would possibly allow rotations in a real model: the stem allows rotation (“yaw”-rotation let’s say), and the rest of the lamp would be attached to this stem and would rotate around this stem (“pitch”-rotation then, see yaw-pitch-roll) … Let’s hope this is the logic to be followed in the end, if not, then I’ll have some more practice doing these steps again 
Stem: created by extruding the bottom face (after duplication, separation and slight scaling, as was the assignment), adding another cylinder, and boolean-modifier-join both
