MacBook Pro Mid-2012, not living up to expectations??

Hi,

I purchased my MacBook Pro Mid-2012 as a refurbished unit from the Apple Store in 2016. I thought that I was getting a good deal on more computer than I really needed, but the price was right. I reasoned that the computer had more "horse power" than I needed for my needs, but that I assumed would mean that it would accommodate whatever I threw at it with ease.

But my experience has been less than something that makes me want to recommend to someone to buy a MacBook Pro. At this point I am not sure I would want to buy another Mac Book Pro or any Mac Book. I have searched the web and been on numerous calls to Apple Support, and my MacBook Pro is "usable" most of the time, but then it goes through periods of being extremely difficult to wake up, and "beach-balling" on a regular basis. Clicking on Finder or Launchpad would seem to me to be something that would happen instantanously, not take literally a minute or more to open. In fact a lot of times, I will click on something to initiate an action and go do something else for 5 minutes or so to give my MacBook Pro time to open it up.

I see other people's MacBooks and they seem to "fly". I go to the Apple store and the display MacBooks are very impressive........so what I am doing wrong so that my MacBook doesn't perform like the rest of the MacBook world?

My memory pressure is in the red a good portion of the time. I currently have 4GB of RAM. The CPU is usually 90% idle. My current OS is Catalina and it is up to date.

I am not a power user working with 3D graphics or doing anything that puts any significant demands on my MacBook Pro. I use it for routine actives like surfing the web, storing pictures and documents and word processing.

I am wondering if I may be just overlooking a setting or something on my MacBook Pro or that I might somehow being doing something that is taxing my MacBook Pro without me realizing it.

I am considering adding another 4GB of RAM and/or upgrading the hard-drive to an SSD. Would these upgrades be of any benefit to get the computer working more efficiently?

Any guidance would be appreciated. I have been a Apple user for over a dozen years and I have an iMac, iPod and a couple of iPads ......all of which have meet expectations, but the MacBook Pro is not making me especially want to run out and purchase another MacBook .

Thank you for any guidance and help that you can give me.