What happened is closer to this: I spent hundreds of hours reading federal civil procedure. I read the statutes I was suing under. I read the case law on pleading standards. I went on PACER and just started buying and reading dockets. I used that to have AI help me understand of what a complaint needs to say, and why, and in what order.

Then I used AI the way a lawyer uses a team of associates.

Draft this section. Cross-reference these defined terms. Check whether this allegation satisfies this element of this cause of action. Flag internal inconsistencies across these six documents. Hold the entire case in memory while I think about what comes next.

The AI didn't practice law. I practiced law, badly at first and then less badly, using AI to do the production work that would have otherwise required a team I could not afford.