I don't tend to use specific terms for various levels; my internal meter is more a color-scale - there are a lot of different gradations within each level, but it still mostly boils down to lower/middle/upper, with different spectrums inside each category. I never figured out concrete rules for being very-poor versus poor versus kinda-poor, though.

And yeah; the impressions we get when we're young are hard to break. I know that, even though I'm solidly upper-middle-class now, I still get the immediate reaction of 'they won't let My Kind in here' when I try to plan fancy vacations or go to swanky restaurants....