Cornbread in the South is like the "dinner roll" in the North. Cornbread is served with everything down here!
Split, buttered, and topped with black-eyed peas with ham, red beans with salt pork, split-peas with smoked ham hocks ... used to sop up the liquor from a mess o' greens .... crumbled up and moistened with a little buttermilk for breakfast, or covered with thick milk cream sausage gravy.
Sugar or no sugar is NOT a matter of Southern vs Yankeefied IMHO .... my grandmothers were from Mississippi and Georgia, one had roots in Scotland and the other from Germany ... and they both made cornbread both with and without sugar - depending on what they were pairing it with ... to the best of my recollections as a child.
Yeah, expatgirl ... toss the skillet in the oven with some bacon grease to "pre heat" - pour in the cornbread ... and wait for the magic to happen!!! I know I keep seeing these corn muffin/sticks/dodgers whatever molds ... but I've never known cornbread worth it's salt that wasn't cooked in a skillet.