Good for you Damian!! i learned with and H9 Alpha by myself and i had no one around to teach me and i always wanted to learn but since i live out next to Death Valley there is not to many people much less people willing to train people on model airplanes
soooo i bought my plane and did all the reading i could here and studied hard for about 3 weeks give or take a week and unlike you im 52 years young and never backed down from anything that couldnt knock me out, well that was 2.5 years ago and i now have four planes in my hangar and love every minute of it, and may i add im a pretty quick learner for an old guy too

good luck to ya and dont let these guys ride ya to hard for learning by yourself[8D]