Sorry for wasting your time with a stupid thread. If I knew how, I would delete the damn thing and hide in a hole somewhere !
Some years ago I was on a PPL course flying an Aircoupe on the final checkride pre-first solo. I just wasn't hacking it - everything was ok up to that point. I was so frustrated by my cr*p performance that I was almost in tears. I saw my first solo going down the tubes, with maybe a complete washout on the cards. However, my instructor took us out of the circuit, settled down straight and level in clear skies and started to discuss approach procedures. I can't remember the detail now, but he patiently answered half a dozen what I later realised were dumb fool questions that I should have known the answer to.
He told me to rejoin the circuit, I flew a few more, landed and he got out. That first solo was the most glorious event in my entire life, thanks to the Solomon wisdom of a WWII veteren.
FFF makes the most valid point anywhere on PPrune:
always remember that there's no such thing as a stupid question, except for the one you don't ask.
Me? I have just hung up my flying helmet after 36 years and 10,000 hours....