I have done absolutely no programming in my life and my closest involvement in game-making is drawing and animating sprites for another programmer to use in his games.

If I have absolutely no experience in programming, is there any game-making software I can use to help create my own 2D side-scrolling game that's beginner-friendly?

I'm sorry if a thread like this already exists but I tried searching for "side scrolling" and didn't get any results.

Then You should give Construct 2 a try

Construct 2 is a powerful ground breaking HTML5 game creator designed specifically for 2D games. It allows anyone to build games — no coding required!

https://www.scirra.com/construct2

Construct 2 Tutorials

You may want to look at: http://www.yoyogames.com/gamemaker

or if you have Steam then: http://store.steampowered.com/app/214850/ (same thing, but on Steam)

I would back the suggestion for gamemaker. It starts easy, but you can move beyond the Drag&Drop into scripting, which then let's you do about anything. It also ends up quite powerful if you want "hardcore" games later too. I mean to say that it scales pretty well, making it easy to make simple games, but able to make more complicated (maybe even AAA) games if you are so inclined.

If I can just hop in and suggest unity, it seems to also support 2D games really well and also supports alot more platforms. Depending on the one you want though, still unity looks really populer if you are leaning to actually learn the language, but if you just want to make simple drag and drop games which aren't bad but learning gives you nore potential, then gamemaker is for you or gamesalad, choose your pick

Thanks for the suggestions.

I'm fairly confident about my animations, it's just the programming aspect I'm lacking.