Trains are pretty easy. You don’t need to turn. Just move stick forward or move stick back. The most challenging aspect is knowing how much air brakes you have and how long it’ll take to recovery the air. You cannot keep applying brakes, you’ll run out of air. In the wintertime it could take hours to pump up the air system again so if you take a brake you better know exactly how much brakes you need and know how long it’ll take to recover the system.
You can get civilian experience by playing train simulator on PC. They have some pretty hardcore versions that are so good that CP and CN uses them.
We were all belt pack trained (basically a giant remote control train) that you control while switching in the yard. So you and your mate pitch the control around and whoever is “it” controls the train while the other guy operates as a normal conductor. Lots of fun. Used the train to slice geese…. Block longshoremen….Got ice cream off venables while blocking everyone… best memories
^this is what a belt pack looks like. Fat guys make it look like a gay ass fanny pack