@grumpygamer I was bit by that too early. the trick that worked for me is adopting habit of, if I'm ever not 100% sure which mode I'm in, to hit ESC key. I usually tap it a few times in quick succession in redundancy as a psychological thing to be sure. After that I know I'm in a fixed deterministic predictable "baseline state" and then next I can press whatever keys I want to do commands or to do edits.

When in doubt hit ESC. Then there is no doubt.