Thoughts on application of EV

[jsthomas64]

I am fairly new to Hold 'em, I've been playing for about 9 months (mostly on-line because I live in Ohio, where gambling is illegal - except for the morally superior lottery and racetracks of course). I would like to hear people's thoughts on how they apply EV in their games.
When I started playing, I played a lot more hands and probably played more aggressively, and was actually ahead over 5-6 months, though granted only like 15%. Then the more I read poker books and learved about EV I feel like I've been playing more tightly and probably bowing out of pots I could be winning, and flat out not ending sessions ahead, especially at lower limit (never above $5/$10) on-line games where play seems to be tremendously erratic, bad beats are handed out like Halloween candy and I don't seem to play against the same people enough to get a solid read on their play.

Any and all thoughts on the application of EV in your overall poker repetoire or critiques on my play would be appreciated. How do players on the forum balance EV with bluffing, playing against bullies, etc. It seems obvious that if you played to the EV all the time you'd miss out on a lot of draw hands, though arguably you'd also not bet into draw hands that don't pan out.

I do realize I need to play a TON more hands to get the experience, so thank you for that advice, but I know that part already)