You waited to water after opening up the roots, right? It sounds like you did the right thing if they were not growing beyond the original ball.
I have killed this plant by underwatering and I have killed it by overwatering. Both are entirely possible in the hands of an average gardener. Maybe if I relate my experience, you may find it helpful in some way. When I first got this plant, it was a cluster of one central rosette and 4 or 5 good sized offsets. So I separated them and treated the individual plants different ways, to try to learn something about their limits.
The underwatering came about because I decided to try out a mesh pot, like some kind of thick fabric, that a friend gave me. I don't remember the name or brand but the idea was that it would help protect against overwatering by allowing the water to evaporate through the sides of the container, much like an unglazed clay pot would. As it turns out the soil would never stay wet for more than a very brief period right after I watered, and the aloe shriveled up, closed in on itself, and winked out. In retrospect I realize the reason the container dried out so fast was because of the tremendously greater surface area compared to a clay pot equivalent.
The overwatering came about because I had one plant in a lower light location where the sun would not actually hit it for a few months out of the year. It was not drying out enough in between watering because it was in the shade, and I was not compensating by watering less often, so the roots turned to mush and that eventually made it into the stem.
So the moral of the story is pay attention to water, and pay attention to light. If you are reasonably disciplined with the watering can, you can keep one of these plants growing for years and years, and it will proliferate and give you more plants to play with. Water well when the soil is dry, not much sooner or a whole lot later. I have good results when my plants get hours of daily sun year round, but less than half a day. They look worse in lots of sun during the summer, especially with our annual summer drought, and sort of spring open in the winter when the light is kinder.
