The easiest way to test a LDO's stability is to step the load, up and down.
Observe the waveform, and adjust compensation until you see a damped waveform. AC sometime give you good PM, but you may be umdamped or have peakings. But you must always do a sanity check in AC, to determine the location of poles and zeros.
you must also do hand calculations to see if it matches the simulator, otherwise, you need to account for it. u cannot ignore what the simulator is telling you until u prove that it is wrong.