The most commonly held prejudice about golf is that it is a sport for the rich, that it goes along with sailing and horse riding as a sport that is ring-fenced off for players that were born with a silver spoon in their mouth. There was a time when this was substantially true, but as time has gone on it has become easier for less well-off players to take the game up and play it for fun – before going on to see if they can get better and if it is worth investing a little more money in better equipment so as to make their game flow better and get more enjoyment from it.
Cheap golf equipment is not as good as more expensive golf equipment – that simply goes without saying. However, not everyone can afford it. Not only this, but it is not always worth spending a bunch of money on the right equipment only to find that golf is not quite for you, or that you cannot afford to keep up your time on the course. If you want to get the best out of your early games of golf, it makes a lot more sense to get more basic equipment and see how good you are early on before adapting as you go along.
It is also not always possible to go to bigger and better courses right at the start, and you may find that you have to play on cheap golf courses, even ones with free entry. Don’t worry too much about that – if you can master those courses, the more exclusive ones will be a walk in the park for you.