In the present paper, a call admission control scheme that can learn from the network environment and user behavior is developed for code division multiple access (CDMA) cellular networks that handle both voice and data services. The idea is built upon a novel learning control architecture with only a single module instead of two or three modules in adaptive critic designs (ACDs). The use of adaptive critic approach for call admission control in wireless cellular networks is new. The call admission controller can perform learning in real-time as well as in offline environments and the controller improves its performance as it gains more experience. Another important contribution in the present work is the choice of utility function for the present self-learning control approach which makes the present learning process much more efficient than existing learning control methods. The performance of our algorithm will be shown through computer simulation and compared with existing algorithms.