After installing the Initial workflow script by @Ulrich_Gesing in Darktable that allows me to speed up basic processing, I decided to use some of the saved time and go back to my earliest pics on DT and see how I could improve them. The results are, to me, laughably better. It mainly shows the poor quality of my first efforts. Hopefully I won’t come back in another year or so and think the same again.
(Thanks should also go to @priort and @kofa who helped me sort out some of the initial problems I had installing the script.)