[mikekchar]

Man, virtually the exact same thing happened to me: forgot to renew my license plate; got a ticket; paid the ticket; clerical error lost paid ticket; license suspended; suspension notice was never delivered (postal strike); got pulled over (suspended license puts your license plate on the "must stop" list); went to court.

The key is what happens next. As an employed software engineer with no priors, I could negotiate. There are many things they can charge you with and it is completely at their whim which one you will get. I apologised profusely in my nice suit and walked away with a (small for me) fine. Other people in virtually the same situation got nailed to the wall. You didn't want to be one of those people arguing how unfair it was to be pulled in to court when you never got a suspension notice.

Of course, they suspended my license again without telling me. Got the notice a month(!) later. I gave up driving after that. Since then I've driven a car maybe 4 times in the last 12 years.