[datavirtue]

Same here, 31 years. I'm 43 and started in around 1989-1990 at age 12. I didn't know anyone who had ever even attempted to program a computer, so I was completely on my own. I have a good grasp now but remain humbled by the craft (coding every day). Nearly everyone I know now is either where I was twenty years ago or insanely elitist. Still on my own.

I have many authors to thank.

[eitland]

Another relatively young programmer here: born in 80 started but started programming somewhere between 92 and 94 on Commodore 64.

I've been extremely lucky to mostly have worked with mostly ordinary programmers with some extremely good[1] thrown in and luckily even with the brilliant ones all except two of them were also down to earth and nice as well.

[1]: "master of all trades", all-knowing teacher types with "saintly" patience, learns-anything-in-two-hours-and-proceeds-to-fix-hard-bugs-after-lunch