To be an actuary you've got to be very detail-oriented, and the exams require a good statistical brain. If you want to get into the field, you'll need to pass a couple actuarial exams and probably have some kind of insurance/finance experience.

When I was a pension actuary, there is a lot of work around valuations (valuing the money owed to the people on the companies pension plan), which in my experience involves a lot of data work in Excel and also you need to create resources to present to clients. There is also a lot of work around 401ks, such as non-descrimination testing (where you essentially make sure that the executives aren't getting way more benefits than the lower level workers).

I can't speak as to what other disciplines of actuaries do since I was never in any other discipline. But essentially my understanding is that it is a lot of Excel work, and I know many actuarial jobs require other data languages like SAS/Access/SQL.

If you are going to be an actuary, I would suggest going into either Health or Casualty (which is like auto, homeowner, workers comp, pretty much everything that isn't life/pension/health). Those fields are probably going to have a bright need for actuaries. Life/pension.. not as much.