Just another update on this to keep me honest: I now have a full nodenthat is syncing blocks.

The VM I deployed is in my test network, but everything is automated, so deloying to a production machine should be easy. I've also filed feature requests to the person who wrote (and hopefully maintains) the automation code to deploy a full node.

The full node is just a first step on the way to the fully automated deployment of a lightning node.

Stay tuned. I may be slow, but I won't let you down (even if this has already been more work than I thought Inwas signing up for).