I think you're getting somewhere. When I was trying, I was pretty stressed out and lost a lot of dream recall. It's great that you can use your mind as a "PDA" of some sort. Once you can get a good grip on remembering your dreams, or just a feeling when you wake up, you'll get really close to LDs.

Do you have a dream journal? It might help. Instead of trying to remember overnight, write down the keywords. Hopefully they'll invoke a response in your brain.