I HAD MY MACBOOK MEMORY CLEARED AND CANNOT UPLOAD MY IPHOTO ANYMORE

I recently had my macbook memory cleared and reset to all default settings. I was advised to back up all my personal documents and data as everything will be cleared. However, due to some technical issue (and one of the reason for memory wipe) i had to manually backup important documents, which were my itune, iphoto, and uni assignments.

After i my macbook had been wiped and returned to default settigns i began to reinstalled the documents i had backed up on my external hard drive. However, when i came to open iphoto it was saying i had to download it from the app store?? when i looked on the app store it was asking for me to buy iphotos for over £10 !! i was not aware i would have to buy this feature as i never originally bought the feature when i first got my macbook. without downloading iphoto i cannot access my photos which was the main thing i wanted to save as these are personal memories of me and my children.

Can anyone help me with this issue as i do not feel i should buy iphoto just so i can recover my own photographs, i have already paid for the memory wipe as it was strongly advised by the technician, who also helped me back up my documents in the store (which took 4 hours). I am correct in thinking that iphoto originally came as standard on my macbook when i bought it in 2009 or will i be required to purchase this and download it again??