Sorry to hear of your trouble. As I remember it was a bit like the scene from Close Encounters of the Third Kind - nice and easy to start with but progressing towards a disco show by the end !
I did once fall foul of the restriction (only permitted to fly to a controlled airfield if comms will be by way of RT) when, after a coms failure, the tower at my destination airfield started flashing their big torch at me. I must say that I was pleased to have an 'interpreter' sitting next to me. However I am sure that it was more of an excuse for the radio operator to play with the gadget that spends 99.9% of its life hung up in his cupboard. At least with a helicopter you can 'pause' before running into trouble if you are not sure what is being said.