Kungfupannda - I immediately thought of you and non-reversing woman when I started reading this - and then there you were on the thread!!
I learned to reverse using a prism in the back window of our first car - a Sierra. It meant I could look in the rear view mirror and see down to the back bumper of the car, which made parallel parking a doddle. We didn't transfer the prism to the next car we bought - a Granada (if I recall correctly, dh said the slope of the back window was too steep, so it wouldn't work) but I found that, doing lots of parking using the prism had helped me learn to reverse without it - if you see what I mean.
I almost always reverse into parking spaces - I think it is easier and safer to reverse into a parking space than to have to reverse out of it. But judging by the number of cars I see parked forward, in car parks, I am in the minority.
I have reversed round the odd corner too - despite having declared, on passing my test, that I was never bloody well doing that again! It has come in handy a few times.
I had a hospital appointment recently, and an elderly gent watched me reversing into a rather tight space - it was not too tight either side, but there was a car parked acrossways, opposite the space, which made reversing in a bit of a challenge - but I managed, and later on, his wife came up to me in the clinic and told me how impressed he had been with the quality of my parking!
All that said, I have found it can be a lot harder to reverse in a straight line than round a corner/into a parking space (either parallel parking or into a carpark space) - I know it sounds barking mad, but I do struggle more, if I have to reverse to a passing place, than I do if I am parking the car or reversing round a corner. I still do it, though - if there is a more convenient space behind me than behind the other driver - that is just good manners.