To boot, this girl skated for 7 years growing up. It's been quite enlightening and also kind of fun watching her get into it.
Sometimes actually having a skill isn't correlated with knowledge of the field. I never took piano lessons, but I always knew a lot more about music than many of my friends who studied an instrument. That's because they spent their "music time" practicing pieces or preparing for recitals, while I listened to classical music on the radio or in recordings for hours on end. They learned only the repertoire they played, while I learned whatever was out there. So in conversations about music, I always know things they don't--but they can read music, and I can't.
Besides, maybe your friend stopped paying attention to the skating world after she stopped skating. It happens. I used to know all the tennis players when I watched more devotedly, but since Sampras and Agassi retired, I sound completly ignorant. Every time there's a big competition, I have to be tutored.
I'm generally the only skating fan in my vicinity. That's why I'm so glad to have this forum! An inexhaustible supply of people who are as crazed as I am about how great the ice dance finals were, or are ready to wax lyrical about skaters who haven't stepped onto the ice in ten years. Or who are happy to mark events like John Curry's birthday without saying "Who?" (September 9, in case you were searching your brain for that. And Rodnina is September 12. Don't ask why I remember those. It's a mystery.)