"Abbiamo avuto ospiti per cena ieri."

[CreyB]

what is called "present perfect" in English is known as the "passato prossimo" (recent past) in Italian.
You might consider it as an action that is "presently perfected"--that is, completed.
A very brief explanation is here: http://italian.about.com/od/verbs/a/italian-verbs-present-perfect-tense.htm

[MABBY]

If they named the lesson "Recent Past" or even "Presently Perfected", as you suggest, then that would clear up a lot of confusion.
When English speakers see the word "Present", it means "now", never "past".
I struggled through the lesson by translating sentences in the present tense that they seemed to be in, and then applied the past tense to my answer. Very tricky.

[MABBY]

This section is "Present Perfect", correct?

How is the word "had" considered to be "Present Perfect"? "Had" is past tense, not present.
I have the same problem with "came", in another sentence. "Come" is present tense, "Came" is past tense. I don't know what "Present Perfect" tense is, obviously.