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Here is the summary of what the person I interviewed, Mina, replied with:

Mina read about how babies can learn to sign earlier than they can talk because signing doesn't require the muscles of your mouth to be ready. When her first child, Jesse, was born, she taught him very simple words like "more", "hot", "cold", "eat" and "all done". Because he started talking early, the signing fell off quickly. Mina taught her second child, Kate, the same simple words, plus she has made up some of her own like "elephant" and "sun". She has also picked up on "yes" and "no" by herself.

Mina started signing to Kate when she was about 4-6 months. Mina taught the signs to her by making the sign whenever she said the word. Kate started signing a ton by the time she was a year old. Now that Kate is learning to talk, her first instinct is still to sign so Mina has to remind her to say the word, too.

Mina wrote that she thinks it would have been cool to use more signs with her kids, it would have just taken more effort on her part. She also said that it doesn't matter if you use the official sign or not, as long as you sign consistently kids will pick it up. Although Mina's children have started to talk on the pretty early, she knows signing can be a great tool for both kids and their parents.