Hi Aubrey, and welcome to your new addiction!
I'm very pleased to hear that you are concerned with flying in a "non-lame" manner. This is quite a novel step for a rookie, and one in the right direction.
You can find out the guidelines for online "culture" here:
http://www.netaces.org/ahtraining/culture.html#title This should show you what's "polite". The entire site is a great read though.
As some people have pointed out, you are in for a steep learning curve. That's ok though, you'll get through it. Get yourself a trainer to get the basics down.
If there aren't any trainers available at a particular time, feel free to contact me and as long as I'm not winging with my squad, I'll be happy to go with you to the DA. I'm not a great pilot by any means but I could show you a few simple moves that should help you out a bit. If I do happen to be winging with my squad, heck, find out where we are and tag along! (We're primarily Knights but we can be found flying for other countries when they are very low on numbers)
At any rate, dueling is a great way to have fun and improve your skills at the same time. If you go in there without an attitude and accept that win or lose you're learning some stuff, it will go a long way towards your improvement.
And if no trainers are available and I'm not on, just type on country channel or channel 200 "Hey I'm new and I keep getting shot down. Can someone please take me to the DA and help me out?" I'm sure someone will help you.
Hope to see you in the game for many months to come!
!