I would concur with RCKen the cowl for all practical purposes is only cosmetic and not a real issue.

Now I am going to offer an opinion that goes aginst the concensus a little. Trainers are working airplanes with a mission which they usually do under all sorts of adverse conditions quite well. In most cases due to their hard life they become ragged cosmetically very rapidly. This in no way affects the ability to perform their tasks.

The point here is far to many people spend so much time fretting over minor cosmetics with their first airplanes that the important items like control setup, proper fuel tank setup etc. gets completely neglected.

Don,t start stripping the covering now. Instead use the time to find a club, instructor or mentor and have this person check the airplane. Chances are it is entirely airworthy with the ugly covering, its not that hard for a knowledgeable person to detect any real airworthyness problems with the cover on. Yea its ugly, so what most trainers get a little
ugly anyway. The point being you could be flying very soon and yes start a kit or whatever as you fly. Have seen many folks so concerned over pointless cosmetics that their training suffers and the acheviement of that dream is vastly prolonged

I am not real familiar with Airtronics numbers but I am sure that Rx is of the type that uses the old style plugs. This is not a real problem other than its goning to a source of much frustration particularly trying to just buy a Tx to match. Please, please buy a whole new radio set of your choice. It will include everything you need and potentially will only cost a fraction more than just buying a new Tx by itself.

Quoting myself "find a club, instructor or mentor" from above is the single most important action you can take in pursuit of that Dream of Flight.

John