I went the other route (straight from a PT twilight hub employee to FT driving). It was tough at first because I had no experience with anything that had to do with driving, I didn't even know the preload. It's tough, but still doable. They'll start you on a training route and that first week will be nerve racking, especially when you start going out by yourself. But after the 2nd week you'll feel a lot more at ease once you get the routine down. Once you qualify and get the experience to feel comfortable with the job, then the hard part becomes getting thrown on blind routes over and over. Luckily at my hub I've only been thrown out cold 7 times or so, and the other 10 routes I did I had the liberty of having a sup with me for the first day. Then after about a year or so you feel like you can handle anything they throw at you. At that point the hard part is simply waiting for your progression to be done so you can start making some real money (top rate).
So yeah, you can go the Saturday air route and kind of ease yourself into driving. But going straight into FT is certainly doable. Looking back if I had the choice I'd still go straight to FT because I got 3 solid years of experience whereas if I did cover driving I'd have gotten less experience and wouldn't feel as comfortable with the job as I do now.
