EVERY PARENT I KNOW HAS AGREED THAT PULL-UPS ARE DIAPERS IN THEIR KIDS MINDS!!!!!! They are for last resort only, in my experience, like taking a trip out really quick to the grocery just in case you can't make it to the potty quick enough!
I potty trained my DD at 18 mos (and am potty training my 20 mos. old boy now). I put the little potty in the room where she was playing so it was convenient and also served as a reminder to use it when needed (but both of my kids preferred the little seat on the big potty as first choice) and we would go to the big potty every 20-30 mins and read. When she went TT, she got a sticker. The rest of the time off the potty, what worked best for us at the beginning was to FIRST let her (and now him) run around our house (we did not do this in public, obviously) with NO bottoms (I put her in a dress or just a longer shirt and let her run around the house bottomless).
When we first started, when DD "TTed", it would run down her leg and this was not too comfortable for her(she was kind of a perfectionist)and she would realize where she needed to go. This method worked better than first putting her in panties as usually with the panties, I would not catch her being wet until after the fact when she would come tell me and wet panties were not quite as uncomfortable as running down the leg or standing in a puddle on the floor from the get-go. Being bottomless, I could catch her during the fact and place her on the potty. She learned that with the action of TTing, she needed to be ON the potty. We did the bottomless method long enough where she could recognize the urge and know how to tell me or get to the potty, even if it was the little potty there in the room; this only took a couple weeks.
Then we went to panties, the trainer type (thick) and she mastered that pretty quickly. I told her when she stayed dry in her panties I would let her pick some "big girl panties" (regular panties) all on her own. When she no longer had accidents for quite a period of time, she picked her first "big girl panties" at the store and was soo proud to get to pick them herself. She chose flowers (and next Dora) and i told her "now flowers/Dora don't/doesn't like to be TTed on so keep them clean and dry by going on the potty and you can keep wearing your big girl panties. That was all it took and we were done! It was like a switch! It took a little bit of time in the training panties for total mastering and we did use the plastic covers over the trainers when we went out to play or we would put her trainers on and a pull-up over them if we had to, but we made sure it was cloth against her skin and not Pull-up! She has never had a problem during the day since and she is just now 3.
We still have a little issue at night but that was kind of our fault because for a long time, her room was no where near a bathroom and down the hall from ours so getting quick help was an issue until recently. However, she is beginning to master that with panties as well!
Like I said, we are doing the same method with our son. We just started training last week (though he has showed all the signs since Thanksgiving and even sat on the potty several times since then but WE were just not ready as we wanted to be very consistent and wanted to make sure no real life changes would throw him off)! Since last week, he as had several days where he has not had an accident one. We will probably go about one more week without bottoms and then put him in britches (panties). We try to take him to the potty every 15 minutes (boys go more often than girls) and he is doing great, even running to the potty on his own when he has an urge from time to time!
OK, I'm rambling but I hope this helps!
Good luck!
T.