Need Help, Digital Camera thats something a professional would use.?

I have a hand held panasonic lumix zs3 which is really nice for me, as an amateur, it has 12x zoom, 10 MP, and wide angle lens and takes pretty pics. But the Rebel series has nicer lenses as a DSLR, it takes beautiful photos, but it's just so big to lug around. Get one though, if you don't mind the luggage. We've loved the shots we've gotten from ours, but always default to the pocket cameras for convenience.