Tim, one way to verify what you are seeing is (as my students do) is to
locate what you see using parallax. If you see an inverted image when
looking through the lens and want to locate it another way (other than
projecting it since it is real) is to take a marker (a pencil or a
thumb) and move it around along the line of sight until there is no
noticeable parallax motion between it and the image you are trying to
locate when you move your head side-to-side.
I generally have my students do this before they use the projection
method. It also works well for virtual images but be sure you look at
your marker and NOT the image of your marker.