Interesting first flight, I have a similar story with several points to learn from. I just learned how to fly for the first time last saturday, I soloed on the next day. I have been flying solo with someone close by just in case. I fly a hobbico nexSTAR with the AFS turned off and with speed breaks on. here are my storied from today alone.

1) First flight of the day - I just fixed a problem last night involving dirt in my fuel tank so last night I had to take off the engine and check the tank, cleared the dirt, added a filter to prevent this problems (which was causing my plane to deadstick and take forever to startup). So prior to the flight I was making sure all my screws were tight and doing some checkups. Well it turns out that the simpliest thing I forgot to check almost injured some fellow club memebers and almost annilated my plane, that thing was checking my radio to make sure the trims were set. I had it trimed from flying yesterday, but as i took the radio out of the car I must have accidently hit the evelvator control, I was completely down = the plane will climb striaght up, it was full UP elevator. Plane took off fine and the second It gained enough speed it went crazy, I had no control of the plane, it was going crazy!! I managed to keep the nose down and keep it controled somewhat while someone ran to my help to fix it because I couldnt take my hands off the control or it would have hit someone. I managed to gain control after someone adjusted the elevator and bring her down.(I was shacking by this time)

***MORAL of the story = Handle your radio carefully and ALWAYS check your gear prior to flight***

2) Two or three flights later - A little piece of information was giving to me a little to late, turns out our landing runway is not complately straing its in a gradual V. To the eye it looks straight because its so long from the pit. Well I was lined up for my landing a little to the right, well I was lined up to the beggining of the field at the far end before it V's. I flew it right into the 10ft trees that surround the runway and pit. Lucky for me I managed to kill the engine prior to impact and that didnt cause the branches get cut up and not hold my plane. The club has a large trailer that has extention poles with hooks, I put on together took the walk out to the tree and grabbed the will and brought it down gently, how much damadged do you ask? None at all, just another scary tale for today.

***MORAL of the story = Check your runway and ask for tips on how to approach from both ends, It may look like your lined up but eye debth perception is fooled alot in our hobby.***

3) Second to last flight of the day - Today was an interesting day So what else could go wrong, well something else did and it is similar to your event jinkers. My left wheel fell off as I came in for my landing, I misjudged the speed so it bounced once and lost the left wheel completely off so I gave it throttle and took her up( A nice touch and go if the wheel hadnt fallen off). So I had one of the instrcutors come over to help me out, he said that he has seen me fly the plane very well so I should try to bring it in. I reasoned with him as much as I could but he insisted I try, So i brought the plane in with him at my side guiding me the whole time. He said do everthing as usually but bring the right wing in a little lower than the left with throttle down slow, the plane was practically gliding in. I got the front wheel down then the right wheel and get the throttle at a low idle and just gave the plane a lot of right turn so the left wheel shaft wouldnt touch the ground untill i slowed down alot, well this worked. The runway got cut up a little bit, and the wheel shaft had a little dirt but nothing bad. I screwed the wheel back on and did one last flight to empty the fuel and brought it in with no problems

***MORAL of the story - After the prior two events I should have gone home and called myself the luckiest guy in the club [8D]! ***