The link you posted is packed with tons of informative text, I found them fun to browse through.

I am not really sure about the background but it looks fine in my opinion. It's really your call but I think it's quite good as it is.

No problem, be sure to let me know if you update this work :)

I didn't know if PJ had a zoom function when I first uploaded this .
I'm going to take your advice and work on this again. The tutorial you posted was how I found PJ (via this post which is also really interesting).

Do you think I should remove the background?

Thanks for your responce! 

This is a pretty nice work for first attempt.

The only thing that bothers me is the lack of shading on the body. You did a nice job with shading the face but the body looks flat. You should play with shading and shadows on the body and remove the dark yellow outline and I believe it will look much better. One more thing: you don't need to post your works pre-zoomed. PJ gallery has a zoom function (those small rectangles under the image) and the viewer can zoom in if they want to see it bigger.

By the way, we have a great tutorial here on PJ forums written by Cure, you should check it out: www.pixeljoint.com/forum/forum_posts.asp

Looking forward to your other works, cheers.