combining form_dropdown() und set_select()

[eluser]Future Webs[/eluser]
Heres my example that I got working for a dropmenu

Code:

<?php
$options = array(
    ''              => 'Select Experience',
    'None'          => 'None',
    'Amature'       => 'Amature',
    'Experience'    => 'Experienced',
    'Professinal'   => 'Professional'
    );
echo form_dropdown('experience', $options, set_value('experience', (isset($my_data->experience)) ? $my_data->experience : '')) ;
echo form_error('experience') ;
?>

The thing that was causing a problem though and making me think this did not work was that if I did not have a validation rule set up for this field then it would not remember the choice if a mistake was made on the form etc

Is this how it should work ?

I would have thought that I would not have needed to set a blank validation rule just to get it to remember the selection. I thought it used the POST values