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I know that in the play games you can rarely get anyone to ever fold. I tried doing the 3 or 4 bet raising there and determined I did better with the play money when I just waited for premium hands and went all in because any dummy will call, but I know it will be vastly different at a cash table.

But I am wondering how well do the micro limit cash player play? Do they understand that a 4 bet raise is a possible big pocket pair or will they do what playdough players do and call with anything? At least as far as your experience tells you.

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I worked my way up from play money on three different sites, then starting at the lowest limits on PokerStars (1/2 cent cash and $1.20 SNG).

I lost my $50 bankroll a couple times, then ran it up to $170. Now I'm playing $5 SNG, and I plan to start playing some MTTs.

There are some incredibly bad players doing the micros. Kids playing with their parents money (and the other way around), and people who will come out and tell you they have no idea what they're doing, i.e., "This is my first time and I'm scared of losing my bankroll".

But I played micros, and most of the people reading this have as well. So everyone there can't be bad. In fact, I saw someone on PokerStars 12-tabling 1/2 cent cash games. I would much rather just move up to 2/4 cent, but to each his own.

So it will be a mixed bag. You might play a 1TT that's over in half an hour, followed by one where you have 5 left after 30 minutes.

You will be drawing with correct pot odds, and cursed and called a moron when you hit. There will be chat pushing right up to the edge of collusion (expect to be cursed again if you mention it).

There will of course be some nice people on (and some that don't chat at all), but be prepared for anything.

Generally, there will be between 0 and 2 other decent players at your table. Learn to adapt to the different players and styles that you will see.

Oh, one thing about the good players. There have been many times where myself and one other player were clearly better than the others. Often an unspoken agreement develops to stay out of each other's way.

I'll see that Joe doesn't play junk, and that he only raises when he has the goods. He figures out the same about me. After that, when one of us raises, it's usually an autofold for the other. We leave each other alone and eat the fish.

As far as losing my bankroll twice, that doesn't mean that you will. I was doing a lot of learning and experimenting. I tried different size SNG, from 9 players to 180. I played about with multitabling before I was really ready to do it. I didn't do much notetaking at first, thinking that at a big site like pokerstars I wouldn't see the same people in SNGs anyway, then saw the same player three days in a row.

Just keep learning, studying, and practicing, and you'll be fine.