I basically bulldozed my way into what I thought was a 'prep cook' job at a local restaurant - had been assisting and teaching cooking classes before that. When I got to work, I found out I was in charge of the pantry! (In restaurant kitchens, that's the station that does aps, salads, dressings, desserts). Talk about learning on the fly! Fortunately I had a great crew to work with.
Went from there to a big catering outfit (more money, better hours), and learned tons more from their head chef, who trained in Europe. Was during this gig that my son was in an accident, sustained a spinal cord injury - so I had to leave there, and was out of commission for three years while he was still in the critical phases of his condition, and we had no help in the house for him at all.
Started back with a small caterer, doing small weddings, parties - she told me we would pretty much divide the work evenly, but it ended up that I was doing everything but the desserts - imagine two days prep for a 100 person wedding party - aps, sauces, main course, sides - done by one person! She was so disorganized I couldn't deal it.
So started doing just very small catering jobs 'under the radar', for friends and hubbie's boss in NYC.
Since we've moved to SC, haven't done anything at all, other than party cooking for friends and family.