Thank you for all of the compliments!
But, I'll add one more comment to get back to helping Bob out as the person who started this thread.
Before I did the 996, I had never used a dual action polisher before. If you pick the right compounds and pads, you have to really try to screw the paint up. Start the least aggressive as possible and just BE PATIENT. Like Chris, I also have a Porter Cable DA polisher with a 6" and 3" backing plate, and griot's orange and black pads for each. None of those is super aggressive, especially matched with the compound/polish I used. The Adams stuff Chris mentioned is also highly regarded, but the Meg's stuff is available everywhere and I wanted to get started that night.
Watched a lot of youtube videos. If you haven't, check out Dallas Paint Correction. He has some excellent beginner videos, as does AMMO NYC.
That said, I absolutely practiced on my wife's SUV that has a door with a ding on it that a paintless dent removal guy can't do anything with, so if I screwed it up, I was most definitely going to blame it on the fact that it's always been there along with the ding.
Found out that polishing is actually a lot easier and much more enjoyable and soothing than I thought it would be.
It's also a massive rabbit hole, because that SUV door was definitely the reason I then had to finish the rest of the Explorer because I couldn't deal with one door that beaded amazingly well and the rest of the car grimy.
(Sigh.)