And just to clarify then, unless a VOWEL is at the start or follows a soft sign, it is pronounced exactly (or more similarly) to the non softening vowel and it is only the previous consonant which gives it this effect?
Yes. At least in theory. And they denoted similarly in Russian phonetic transcription. Russian phonetic transcription does not use я, e, ё symbols at all (I know that IPA guys can find difference even where there is not). Although both [ы] and [и] are used in school transcriptions, many sources say that Russian has only 5 vowels (а, о, э, и, у) http://russkiyjazik.ru/337/ , http://www.langust.ru/rus_gram/rus_gr04.shtml with which I agree.