how long does it take to learn to drive?

I have been driving on a provisional licence for over two years now and honestly I'm not a fantastic driver but I'm not a terrible one either. I have only done one driving test and I can't say I liked it all that much so I've been putting off redoing it just a little. I can think of a few things that are likely to hold me back such as the way I reverse around corners (badly !) and my complete inability to parallel park. I'm pretty sure that driving alongside the cerb until you feel you're close enough to it to stop doesn't actually count as parallel parking.

Lately though, my nieces, who are five and seven, have shown a great deal of interest in the big red L plates that sit on my car windows and over the last few weeks when I am driving around the place we seem to be having many conversations about what the Ls stand for, the fact that I am a learner driver and how long it takes to learn to drive.  I do know that kids of that age call the world as they see it and as far back as they can properly remember, I have been learning to drive. Where as on the other hand both their parents and my parents are driving around big letters on their cars. Now I know part of their thinking behind it stems from the fact that both of them are in school and they are learning to read and write and so on but because they say they are 'learning' to do it, that means that currently they don't do it very well and it's only logical to think that the same thing would apply to something like driving.

So far we have discussed the driving test and the fact that I have tried it once before and then we had to talk about why I failed it. To simplify matters I said it was because I didn't do a very good job of reversing around corners and was informed that it was an easy thing to do because the younger of the two says she finds that easy when she's pretending to drive. Funnily enough so do I. It's a shame that they wont take how well you pretend to drive into account when you're sitting your driving test.

We've also talked about how much a driving test costs and we've all agreed that's a lot of money and we've also talked about the driving lessons cost and how you usually need to get a few once you've booked your test just to see where you need to improve and we've also clarified that you don't need to give the driving instructor money if you bump into him town, only if you're seeing him for a lesson. I will admit that I'm grateful for that.
I think the moral of the story is I really need to get my full licence and I swear I will, soon, real soon. 

It's kind of like the dentist, It's the sort of thing I am putting off because of the cost and because I really really don't like doing it. All the same it needs to be done and I've decided once I get back from Edinburgh, I'll take some money out of the credit union and book myself in for round two and then maybe just maybe I'll be able to tell those little ladies that Auntie Laura isn't learning to drive anymore