Well, its not like you should never jump in. There are times where you can condition your opponent to not AA. You could blow up their AA with like late divekicks and such, which works best on AAs such as Sakura's cr.hp, condition them to block and BAM! Free pressure.
what you said about hitconfirmin wasn't wrong, but its not the best idea. If your opponent catches on to the fact you're mashing lights then you're very open for mashed DPs and such, mashing lights all the time is not the best idea.
I'd like to add to the meter management. Sitting on meter may not always be the best option, but don't use meter just because you have it. sometimes it is good to sit on meter for a bit. When you have more meter, you have more options. This can make your opponent scared to do stuff, like apply pressure. Say you're Ryuand they knock you down, they might think twice about doing anything on your wakeup because you can srk and fadc to not get punished, so theres very little risk for you and a lot of risk for him.