i think it's worth a try to directly upgrade to the current version.
i did an upgrade vom 1.1 beta to 1.2 rc2 withou a problem (just upload all files and run the upgrade program).
as you make a backup before upgrade (at least you should do, no matter where you upgrade from) the worst thing you have to do is using this backup and then do a step by step upgrade. (remember to backup the database, too when doing an upgrade to a higher major version!!)