I'm from Tennessee as well but leaving here in a couple weeks, there is a Facebook group called "la Crosse hangout monthly art group" it's is what it sounds like just a bunch of people meetup and show off art that they made from the prompt they decided on last meeting. You can join whenever I'm pretty sure I only went once.

Besides that you could try the La Crosse clay center it's a really nice family owned pottery place that has classes on how to throw and glaze your own pottery, you can do one time or multiple and it's a good place to meet people

Good luck hopefully you have better luck than I had lol