so i passed my technician exam last tuesday and honestly still kind of in shock that i did it, studied for like three weeks on and off using hamstudyorg and just went for it. got my callsign a few days later and ive been glued to my baofeng ever since just listening mostly. managed my first actual QSO yesterday on a local 2m repeater with a guy named gary who was super patient with me when i fumbled through my callsign like four times. he gave me a 59 and i was shaking a little lol. anyway just wanted to introduce myself, this hobby is way more interesting than i thought it would be and im already looking at HF stuff which is probably getting ahead of myself but here we are

welcome to the hobby, getting ahead of yourself is basically a ham radio tradition so dont worry about that. the jump to HF is worth it when you're ready, just dont let anyone talk you into spending a fortune right away. plenty of decent used rigs out there. congrats on the first QSO, the nervousness never fully goes away honestly, i still get a little twitchy calling CQ sometimes and ive had my general for like six years

dude same situation here, got my ticket in march and my first repeater contact was a mess too. the baofeng is fine to start but yeah HF is a whole other world, i picked up an old ic-718 off qrz classifieds and its been great for just getting on 40m and seeing whats out there. good luck