There's no such thing as stupid questions.

As for an answer, the dream can easily become as vivid as waking life and possibly even more so. Colors can become brighter, senses can grow stronger and everything can just become more life-like than actual waking life. There are varying levels of vividity as well as lucidity, however. The dream you described sounded like it had a lower level of lucidity which can cause for your decisions to become almost automatic, like you can't control them, even though you know you're in a dream. The level of lucidity will grow with practice and after a few you should be able to completely control your dreams with some ease.

Vividity seems to be mostly random to me, however, especially when talking about non-lucid dreams. Some say you can increase vividity during lucids by saying "increase vividity" or something similar, which seems highly possible though I've never done it, myself. Also, normal dreams are usually remembered in fragments and you don't remember very specific details such as a certain shirt color, feel of an object, etc. Lucid dreams are generally more easily rememberd and feel more like an actual memory, and not just a little tidbit of information.

Hope this helped