I played the microstakes last night for a couple hours at party poker last night. Was very sound advice that a previous poster gave to just go ahead and try the cash microlimits.

For me it was mainly a learning/practice experience; I wanted to try different starting hands from different positions as well calculating pot odds, number of outs, etc. It was a very good experience. I definitely think my game improved over the course of the 2-3 hours I played. I went from 5$ buy in up to about 8.75$, then I made a big mistake that cost me a big chunk and down to about 2.50$. I didn't feel too bad about it (other than the usual, oops what was I thinking!?) as it taught me the most important lesson of the night. I learned that I shouldn't be so reluctant to hold onto a pocket ace and decent kicker if the table is showing an ace and a couple other face cards (that don't match my kicker) as someone probably now has two-pair. I believe I read the same lesson on FTR, but having it actually happen to me really hammered it home.

Anyway, thought I'd let everyone interested in this thread know that real cash games are the way to go for actual practice. I would suggest reading FTR and a poker book or two first if you can though.