I also taught myself with the realflight G2 simulator. I flew on it for probably about 40 hours before trying an almost indestructible plane, the SPAD QHOR. I did just fine when it came time to fly. I was a little nervous, but I had been trying so much crazy attitudes on the sim, that I pretty much flew it like a pro. After getting bored of straight tooling around,, my only two crashes were while inverted, 5 feet off of the runway when I pulled out of it. The QHOR "wings" flexed too much and I lost aileron effectiveness. Result: Rudder got bent, broken prop. The only other time I crashed was when I got the QHOR into a spin (intentionally), and it did not have enough altitude to get out of it. The next time I tried from higher up, and I did get it out of it.

I do not necessarily recommend this for everyone. I have been building and flying control line planes, rockets, and real planes. I do have a private pilot's license. I have a good understanding of aerodynamics, physics, and engineering principles. I am also 42 years old. I have more discipline and delayed gratification capacity than an 18 year old. I waited to fly a real RC plane until I was CERTAIN that I could adeptly handle ANY plane on the G2 sim in almost any kind of situation.

I went out to the field and just flew the QHOR. No one there knew that that was my first real flight. No one even suspected. It is possible to do this. But IMHO, the realflight G2 simulator is REQUIRED. You will NOT BE ABLE TO FLY an RC plane until you have trained yourself on the sim extensively.