Public Speaking

I thought I was ready to take the dreaded Introduction to speech course that is on my agenda of classes to take for my associates. Just after the first class last Thursday I felt that now is just not the right time. On the first day all the students had to go up in front of the class and tell a little bit about themselves. When it was my turn to speak I panicked. I still went up and went through with it but when I looked out at all those faces everything became blurry, my heart started racing and my face turned beat red. On top of that the class was supposed to ask the speaker questions about themselves after they did their little intro...and nobody asked me questions, the instructor had to ask the questions. I was sympathetic to the other students who went up before me, I initiated some of the first questions if another student didn't speak up first. Why didn't I get the same common courtesy?
Then while reading the book material assigned, and during the preparation of my first speech I panicked just doing that. So needless to say I dropped the course and will attempt to take it a couple semesters from now. I feel like a failure in a way but I would have felt like more of a failure if I didn't pass the class.