Yes, examples are critical. It is possible, however, to make the examples TOO simple. I've seen this a lot in the documentation for libraries in the programming

Yes, examples are critical. It is possible, however, to make the examples TOO simple. I've seen this a lot in the documentation for libraries in the programming language R. The examples are so stripped down and abstracted from what you would use in actual work that you can't see how to apply them in a useful situation.