Well back in the 70's Ugly Sticks were commonly referred to as "aileron trainers" as they were often a learning pilots first 4 channel plane. So absolutely, a beginning pilot can train on an Ugly Stick, In fact, I have a vintage one in the garage that I plan to use for exactly that purpose.

But the fact that it's a good trainer doesn't mean it isn't a good plane to progress on. What makes it a good trainer is that it's aerodynamically dear near perfect for being pilot friendly. It's lightly loaded, doesn't have any significant couplings, handles wind incredibly well, has a huge flight speed envelope, and takes off and lands easier than any trainer ever did. It really is the perfect second plane if one's goal is to build piloting skill. Set it up a touch nose heavy for incredible stability in the wind and very predictable gliding, and move the CG back when you are ready to push the limits and be a little wild.There's just nothing not to like about a well built and properly set up Ugly Stick.

If you get one of the ARF planes, I'll toss this out there to you, Skyflier. Get some finishing resin for fuel proofing. You can use your regular epoxy thinned with alcohol if you want, but finishing resin will cure more reliably when you apply it as paint. Put a coat on the firewall before you mount the engine, including the holes where the blind nuts go for the engine mount. Also fuel proof the area where the tank goes. Hopefully that won't ever get fuel soaked, but it only takes one damaged fuel line or split tank to do it. I'll say paint everything forward of the wing mount with a thin coat resin to be safe. If you move your landing gear forward you'll be in there anyway, so it's not a big chore. Also, beef up that landing gear mount. IIRC, the Great Planes stick has the gear mount sitting in notches in the plywood fuselage sides. That design is only as strong as the wood fibers of the mount plate, which really isn't strong enough. So when you move the plane create that mount and then add hardwood pieces going up the fuselage sides that are expoxied onto the fuselage sides and also the gear block. That doubles your gluing area and improves the strength of your gear block substantially. It may increase the strength more to put a screw in from the bottom into those reinforcements at the front on both sides since all the stress will be pushing the gear backwards. You could also fiberglass it in if you are so inclined. But several decades of experience has shown that the block reinforcement makes it strong enough provided that you don't use an overly stiff landing gear.