[Tex/LaTex] Reduce white space between figure and note below figure (in minipage)

Question

I have a figure with a note below (not a caption: "blah blah blah…" in the below MWE). I would like it to be directly below the figure, but currently there is far too much white space separating them.

The code I am currently running is below. I am using the minipage environment because the figure I am inserting is very large (it was generated in Stata, and I have tried saving it in multiple ways without luck). Is there a way to reduce the white space in this environment? I have already tried using \vspace as I do after the caption, and it doesn't work. Same for the caption package, \abovecaptionskip, etc. If someone could help, I would really appreciate it! Thanks in advance.

\documentclass[12pt]{article}

\begin{document}
\begin{figure}[h!] 
\begin{centering}
\begin{minipage}{0.95\textwidth} 
 \caption{My Title Here}\label{mylabel}
 \vspace*{-4cm} 
\includegraphics[height=8in]{figure.pdf}
{\footnotesize blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah.\par}
\end{minipage}
\end{centering}
\end{figure}

\end{document}

Answer 1

The root of the problem, I gues, is the white frame around the figure generated in Stata. If you crop the figure appropriately, it will fit easily on the page as the example below. The showframe option is just for testing, you can remove it later. Also, \vspace is not needed here as well as the minipage as @DavidCarlisle mentioned.

\documentclass[12pt]{article}
\usepackage{graphicx}
\usepackage[margin=1in,showframe]{geometry}
\begin{document}

\begin{figure}[h!] 
   \centering    
     \caption{My Title Here}\label{mylabel}

     %\vspace*{-4cm} 
     \includegraphics[height=8in,width=.95\textwidth]{example-image}

     {\footnotesize blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah.\par}      
\end{figure}

\end{document}