No, see, this is exactly the type of misunderstanding I wanted to clear up: there is an entire lineage of different hominids that came after the split with chimpanzees. If we consider gorillas, orangutans and chimpanzees apes, then all of the hominids are apes. And all of those hominids either went fully extinct, or interbred with early homo sapiens to leave some living traces of their DNA with us, and then went extinct.
So "our predecessors" isn't specific enough. One might mean our pre-ape ancestors, like you do, or the subgroup of apes that is hominids.
So "our predecessors" isn't specific enough. One might mean our pre-ape ancestors, like you do, or the subgroup of apes that is hominids.