It won't keep running though, right? I expect it to run for a couple seconds and die. My thinking is that if I don't have the ignition on I won't know when to turn the choke off - maybe too soon and not enough fuel or too late and the engine is flooded. If the ignition is on then the engine will pop and then I'll know I can turn the choke off and the engine should start up. I'm not trying to argue with you - again, I'm new to gas. I'm just explaining my reasoning behind this.
It should probably go ahead and separate the choke from the ignition so I can play around with it in different configurations until I find what makes it easiest to start the engine.