Access gets a bad rap from a lot of IT guys who are used to much bigger, more robust and capable enterprise level database engines, but for the average Joe
Access ( or some of it's open source alternatives ) are quite powerful.
But as Dee said, out of the gate they are just an "engine" that needs to be "installed" into a vehicle to make use of it.
I've started with Paradox way way back, writing complete applications in PAL, later switched to MS Access and been using it ever since.
Though I have only touched it to add a few new query-s here and there or corrected a few report layouts, but my primary shop management I wrote
about 18 years ago and it works very well for what I want it to.
Back in the Borland-era, Paradox was the king of the small scale database management tools.
Looks like it's still around in the COREL professional suite, may want to try them as well.
Do note though that no matter what you get, you WILL have to write the application almost from scratch, so there is quite a bit of learning involved.
Not to use, but to create ant tailor the app. for your needs.