[matmann2001]

I was one of these people.

In middle school, a teacher showed us how to make a pythagorean theorem program, and I immediately saw the potential. When asked if it were possible to make a quadratic equation program, the teacher told me it couldn't be done. I had one written by the following day's math class, and I was hooked.

By high school, I was writing actual graphical games for the TI. I even taught friends so they could help contribute.

If it weren't for that freedom to explore, I would never have even gotten into software. And while pursuing my degree, I came to realize that my friends and I had "invented" some core programming concepts, things like hashing and basic cryptography (so no one would steal our game assets).