Android : Changing background color of actionbar

My Android app uses a minimum SDK version 15. I am trying to change the background color of the Actionbar and want to do this by changing the style and theme. I've tried many things but the background remains dark. Here is what my styles look like:

<style name="AppTheme" parent="@style/Theme.AppCompat.Light.DarkActionBar">
    <item name="android:actionBarStyle">@style/MyActionBar</item>
</style>
<style name="MyActionBar" parent="@android:style/Widget.Holo.Light.ActionBar">
    <item name="android:background">#eeeeee</item>
</style>

In my manifext I set the application's theme to AppTheme.