I would suggest levelling combat.

I levelled to the early 40's as a subtlety rogue.

Great opening damage but hard work if it was resisted. Adds were a bit more of an issue, had to vanish or run away lots.

I swapped to combat and I wish I had levelled that way. No need for much stealth just get in the face of the mob and burn it down. Survivability was quite good.

I would recommend macroing up changing to a dagger in your main hand when you stealth (and macro up your openers to swap back to a sword in your main hand when you pop out of stealth. This way you still get big hits opening up out of stealth when you need to.

The reason I think there are a lot of gnome rogues is for that pesky escape artist ability, plus they are difficult to click on when they are running round like a loon under your feet. (but from the sounds of it I suspect you've gone humans already).

If you can solve the issue of not all facing the same way with a mob (and it sounds like you have) then I think you will have a blast.