Gosh, I hate the flash!

A few weeks ago I had to attend a party in RL. As being an amateur photographer, I always have my camera with me. It was a beautiful weather outside. The sun was shining, it was hot, one of the only days in August, but we enjoyed it. I took pictures outside of all the people as I used to do.
Only it was different. I could not choose the angle like I wanted to, I could not fly over the crowd to have a better view, I could not take a picture of someone on the other side.;(( It was difficult, to work like that, and it did even not getting better.
At the time we were invited inside, I had to take pictures of the tables. I started with a flash, gosh, I hate the flash. I saw immediately that the pictures were already overexposed. So I decided to take the pictures without flash, as I used to do in Second Life. But that was not the right decision, looking afterwards. The results were bad, very bad. The ones with flash were overexposed, the ones without were blurred. Gosh I hate that flash. Or was it because I was used to take pictures in SL and not in RL? Or was it because I am a lousy photographer?;)
I think I need urgently to take pictures again in RL, because apparently I am loosing my skills there.