Congrats man!
I, too, used to be an AM at a decent network (well, it was decent at the time). I remember thinking I was going to have a killer month in commissions, but something happened internally which quickly destroyed that fantasy. A few months later, new management came on board (some of them had ZERO knowledge of the affiliate space) and made some drastic chages which started affecting my book of business.
I was bitching to one of my affiliates at the time who was just starting his private network. He's like, "dude, why don't you run some offers through me?" I'll never forget that time, about a year ago, when I threw up my first campaign... Within a day or two I was hitting 100-200% ROI on $5k+ spends. Ah, the good old days. Then back in March after one too many clashes with upper management, I parted ways with the network and took it up full time. Best decision I've ever made...
Good luck to you, Brad!