No, you can be a RINO and not be elected. There are plenty of RINOs running around, even here on FR, and they are not elected.
On the other hand the "countryclubbers" were always more interested in party operations and internal politics so you did have folks in the infrastructure who didn't share the ideological position of the rank and file, or "base" of the membership.
Every now and then one of the party professionals (who never get beyond positions within the party structure) will pipe up and tell us what they think and if it's obnoxious enough they are encouraged to get new jobs somewhere else. That doesn't mean they are RINOS.