Hollywood, as long as there are no hills around you, it wont be that bad. I had taken my drivers test using an automatic, which was a no-brainer. The first car I bought was an MG and it came with a stick so I had to learn. I freaked when I was going up a mountain and the traffic light at the top was red. The car kept rolling back and the person behind was freaking out thinking I was going to crash into them. Luckily, my friend who was in the passenger seat had a TR6 and knew how to drive, so we just switched seats. Its a good idea to bring someone who knows how to drive a stick when you go out the first few times.
You learn to shift slowly at times and sometimes might not give it enough gas, but with practice you will easily learn it. I even noticed that I have to shift different manual cars at differant rpms depending upon the gearing and power curve, so each car is a little different.
Wonder if learning to shift a motorcycle is harder than learning to shift a car? Maybe you could start with a bike to get an idea of how it works. Are you allowed to drive on the beaches up there? If you fall off into the sand it wont hurt as much! Thats how I learned to drive and shift three-wheeled Honda ATCs when I was a teenager.