How to put simple labels on pictures

I want to simply label a photo with street names.

In my humble opinion, this is something that Mac ought to be able to handle.

I am not a graphic design expert and I do not expect to have to learn a lot of graphic design stuff to do that.

Pages does not allow text to be rotated over a picture. If it is not horizontal, it cannot be done within Pages (ie not like WordArt in Office).

So, I purchased Art Text 2, which lets me create words which can be tilted etc. Then I copy and paste into my Pages doc. I make the photo inline, and then I make the word graphic floating and so that it does not cause wrap. It is there on my screen, but the instant I select it, it literally disappears. Nothing will get it to come back. Even making invisible objects visible.

Nothing works - I have tried all the things. I have tried making the photo background - I have tried making the photo floating. But the problem of the disappearning Art Text object still happens.

Does anyone know how to do what I am trying to do? Sometimes the road is tilted on the page, and I simply want the words to be able to follow the tilt. Surely there must be a way to do something so simple using Macs - which are supposed to be the gear of choice for graphic design. I am not talking high end photoshop manipulation here - just something really basic.