While I think you're right about most things in your hypostheis Tank, personally I think it's unfair to conclude that 'us humans created God out of ignorance and need'. I think that may be a major reason why the belief in gods persists today, but it might not be the reason why people originally started to believe in their existence.
To me, it doesn't seem illogical or ignorant for people to have believed in gods thousands of years ago, when people lacked the technology and scientific knowledge we have today.
Technology has nothing to do with it. Ignorance, credulity and evidence has everything to do with it. Early man has the same problem theists have today...faith. There was no proof whatsoever for early man to believe there was a mountain god or a spirit of the river and the like. Because they didn't know the 'scientific' how's and why's of lightning, it is still illogical for them to "believe" in a lightning god without evidence of the lightning god itself. It is perfectly logical to think that early humans created the gods out of ignorance and need.
technology has everything to do with it. If you didn't know what the Sun, Moon, stars and planets are, why wouldn't you consider them gods? 5000 years ago, how could anyone have known that the Earth was round or that it rotated around the Sun, or that the Sun was a giant ball of helium and hydrogen. Science and technology have helped us to explain the Universe, but people didn't have that luxury 5-6,000 years ago, they explained the cosmos through myths.
I think it was perfectly logical for people to believe in a flat Earth, then a geocentric model of the cosmos. They then saw the heavenly bodies that inhabited the celestial dome as gods / heavenly rulers and to explained their movement through myths and stories.
Obviously there was also faith and supersition in there too, but there was a strong element of science in ancient religion (particularly mathematics and astronomy). My point was I don't think it was inherently ignorant for people to believe in gods thousands of years ago as there was no scientific explanation for the existence of the cosmos, the movement of the heavens or anything else. Before 5000 years ago there wasn't even any writing.
I don't think many Greeks who were reasonably educated or intelligent ever seriously thought that lightning was Zeus throwing thunderbolts down from heaven. He was a celestial sky god, and lightning comes from the sky, therefore it became one of his attributes and he was often depicted with a keraunos in his hand.