When I started dream journalling, I also experienced non lucid dreams in which the concept of dream popped up.
Record these events in your dream journal and monitor them (I also count the number of deja-vu's). At the end of each month, count the number of events. You may see an increasing trend month after month, which indicates that you are getting more often very close to turning lucid.

It is totally normal for the frequency of real lucid dreams to increase very slowly. Monitoring other metrics, such as the average number of dreams recalled or the frequency of the idea of dream in dreams, helps to see the progress we actually make.