trying to make a custom lilypad-type plant

i have spent the last 2 hours trying to make a lilypad. ive gotten it mostly functional in everything but texture. i dont know how to code but i can sorta read it, i copied the lilypad json file and it sort of worked. the problem is that the texture has a black background is is darkened. i changed the light transparency, set the occlusion thing to false, enabled the skylight propagation thing, etc. but everything i tried either did nothing or resulted in a missing texture. i gave up when i ran out of ideas and deleted it but im just wondering what the problem was, since the code was identical to the lily pad in everything but the texture and tint i think