Ripe 29F blundering their first dating foray

29F and never been in a relationship. People have expressed interest and confessed to me pretty steadily over the years, but romance/sex/etc. has never been something I wanted to explore until more recently.

I’ve been going on a stream of dates to test the waters, and met someone I’d like to get to know on a more intimate basis. They’re extremely careful around me even though I’ve told them to act selfishly—they probably can’t help it given my lack of experience. To their credit, they took a risk and went for a kiss on our last date, right before we parted ways. I had been more or less expecting it, and so even though my brain was all but yelling yeah!! it’s happening!!, I panicked, likely made a face, stepped back, and asked for a hug instead.

We’d made clear in an earlier convo that neither of us are hugging people.
I just… I’m a dumbass lol.

Anyway, I can’t help but worry that they may have construed that whole thing in a way I hadn’t intended. I’m aware how juvenile this sounds. But I am interested in this person, and plan on making it clear to them that I’d like to keep seeing them. Problem is, what I think and verbalize to them—that they should just “go for it”—suggests I don’t have any hangups about physical intimacy when in real I’m apparently very freaked out by the idea. Something isn’t linking up between what goes on in my head vs. heart.

Advice would be cool and appreciated.