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Then you set google messages as the default messaging app in your phone. That's the transition. All old texts are still there, it's just a more feature-rich interface (shows you indicator that the other user is typing, for instance, which Samsung messenger does not).

Also FYI for all, there's one "AI" feature that may "phone home", and that is the "Magic Compose" feature. IOW when you use this feature to write for you, it may reach out to the cloud (by default) and send it up to 20 of your recent messages in order to "compose" your message for you (personally have never used, don't imagine I will, ever).

Important Caveats: When I say it "may", here's what that means:
1) If you have an S23 or older Samsung, Magic Compose will always send messages to cloud *IF* you use the Magic Compose feature. The processor itself lacks AICore, so no ability to process your texts locally.
2) If you have an S24, Magic Compose *may* be setup currently to send messages to cloud *IF* you use the Magic Compose feature, BUT you have an option to set it to send your recent texts to Gemini Nano (which is a purely local AI engine i.e. nothing is sent to the cloud for processing, it's done on your phone itself), you just may have to tweak a setting to enable Nano instead. Apparently some S24's handset will default differently from others, probably based on when the phone was made (later ones will already be set to Gemini Nano).
3) If you have an S25 or S26, Gemini Nano is the DEFAULT AI engine for Messenger, so you don't have to do anything to keep your texts 100% local even if you use Magic Compose.