You're right on the mark, Tony. Looking at printed photographs provides a most welcome sense of completion. For me, it is the true culmination of my art more so now with digital that back in my colour and B&W darkroom days. I find I learn from the print. No that I couldn't have learned from a monitor image, but having the scene before me in large format makes a huge difference.
Printing and looking at the scene again in large format certainly recaptures the mood of the day that cannot be achieved with a digital projector, large-screen TV or monitor. I think it has to do with the mode of projection/display and pixels. All that technology and electricity seem to get in the way of enjoying the scene. A print is more organic.
To paraphrase AA (not that we haven't heard it before!), "The negative (or raw file) is the score; the print is the performance."
I must, however, disagree about the using a print service, unless they are doing custom work (at least based on my own experience). Never was I able to feel that sense of achievement with a outside service provider - it's what drove me to purchase a large format printer.