Some minmatar lowsec are pipelines to nullsec and are notorious for having pirate gatecamps – including smartbombing setups. Other systems have folks that camp because they are bored and want to cyno in capitals on folks and dunk.
In general, do a little research beforehand: Zkillboard will give you very rough ideas whether kills are serendipitous versus repeat locals. That gives like a 10% idea, the other 90% is just going out there are actually trying to earn a living in the systems, and just being very delibrate with taking in information the whole time. Living and breathing it by becoming a small part of the ecosystem is the best way to learn.
Also: If you’re “playing alone”, don’t play solo. Talk in local, sometimes you will make friends or frenemies.
(I did something similar to OP, except went out to NPC Null)