I passed out reading this late the other night, forgot to post.
Bob, Im happy you found another passion to chase, guitar is a great way to find a new connection to all the music you've grown to love. This thread was a fun read, I was cheering once you got the fingers worked in, but love how you powered through the pain, lol. I once bled all over pops' 70s gretch while playing a battle o' bands in high school.
I was never that technical, I learned E, G, C, D chords from the old man, and went from there. Never accomplished much, but never continued playing the amount I did from 12-17. I wish I did keep it up through the years, but the apartment living was always a hindrance on my love to plug in(loud).
Now being away from that, I've been able to find time to play more.
Nowadays, I use the guitar as a therapist and sometimes a punching bag. You can really get a lot of emotion out with out even saying anything once you know your guitar a bit more.
Now on to the analog/digital guitar learning. I haven't kept up past the first few guitar hero games, but to me, it always seemed that GH could definitely teach the rhythm aspects of both hands. Now that it is fully incorporated with a real guitar, I don't see why it wouldn't be almost/as much/or better than learning from a teacher. You have the added bonus that its a game, which is slick, me and the wifie were GH junkies back in the day.
My only advice is, once you get to a certain level of comfort with the fret board, learn a few scales that revolve around the music you want to play, take all the chords you've learned, and go on your own journey, find your own style. I had a great buddy in high school, fricken prodigy, but was over taught (in my book), and seemed to be stuck in an endless Steve Vai solo, which is phenomenal, but I feel that emotion was not all there when everything is focused on super technicalities.
Anyway, that's my thoughts for ya. I really loved the enthusiasm reading through this thread. I'm happy for ya. You'll be rocking way more than those tunes by the wedding, if you keep it up.
@ jam, that was awesome! Love it, my pops had Old'nThe Way on the turn table a lot when I was a kid, always loved messing around with his banjo and mandolin.