Its not that hard, belive it or not. You can drive it like an 8-speed if you really want, then adapt to splitting the uppers as needed.
If you drive a stick bug, think of it like this-
1,2,3 are normal, but lets say you have a 4, 4.5, 5, and 5.5 as well.
So, lets say you are in 5th, and don't necessarily want/need 4th- well, you can go into 4.5 (in between 4 and 5) or you can still go into 4th if you desire. Its literally the flip of a button, and looks a LOT more intimidating than it seems.