I absolutely agree. You may be first in line, but if you say no, they'll just open the door and yell, "NEXT!!" But, the picture is not so bleak. The reason AO jobs come open is that people leave them. They either get promoted to the Control Room, bid out to better jobs outside operations, quit, or retire. What I'm saying is that there is zero growth in AO jobs. The number of them is fixed or shrinking. So, in order for an opening to have occurred, someone had to go away. When they left they took all their training and experience with them. When you get hired, you fill only a small part of the gap created by their departure.
What this all means to you is that once you fill out the rest of the missing talent and experience you become valuable. At that point, keeping you is way better than replacing you. Unless you are taking over the job of someone who was fired, they would have rather kept him than hire you. When they can say the same about you, you can expect a little appreciation in your pay envelope. The time to ask for money is when you are sitting in the Op's Manager's office going over your stellar performance review. So, give it your best shot for the next six months or so and good luck. During this time, keep your eyes open for those openings for Shift Technical Advisor, Shift Engineer, Refuelling or Project Engineer ... etc. If one of those opens up, you will stand out from all the other NucE graduates because you will already have a track record within the company.
But, based on my experience, they are not going to haggle with you at this point. They are going to go down the list of all the qualified candidates until one of them says yes. If it is enough to keep you out of bankruptcy court, and you have no better offers, take what they are paying. Then, do your best to earn a raise.