Completely agree. I am in the same boat as a Canadian not wanting to move to the states. While it may be true that many investors will rule you out based on location; my firm belief is that first time entrepreneurs should spend their time acquiring customers, not investors.
Customers generally don't mind if you're not in the valley (although it is true that if your product is built for tech oriented people the bay area may be a high customer saturation zone.)
It matters to customers who are themselves in the valley, like me. I know the teams behind most of the products and web services I use, and it matters that I know who to call when something doesn't work. If customers in the tech world are important to you, you should be where you can go meet them for coffee.
It's not just for investors. It's much harder to exit to a US acquirer if your tax/legal structure is that of another country. Due diligence is longer and more expensive and I have heard of cases where UK companies have been skipped due to potential issues of integrating founders re immigration and IP laws.
Customers generally don't mind if you're not in the valley (although it is true that if your product is built for tech oriented people the bay area may be a high customer saturation zone.)