[mattbgates]

It was over 12 years ago now... but before then, I'd only taken up programming as a hobby. I was addicted to gaming and computers during my high school years, either playing a game or coding something.

Went away to college for something completely different, psychology, but when I got home and started applying for jobs, nobody would hire someone with a bachelors in science only.. so I decided to pull out an old trick of mine: I would apply to the programming companies too. Got an interview. Got the job. Even though my math skills were horrendous.

The confidence in my programming skills came a few months after they hired me. Til then, I'd been working on building various little programs that had no real purpose. A ping pong came, a slot machine, etc. My tyrant boss had me go through training to use various functions in Visual Basic 6. Some of the most valuable ones were using arrays and collections, which had helped me understand databases later on when I was learning PHP.

I was developing software for an autobody shop. I really couldn't wait to work "in the main program" but once it was established that I was ready, that's when the confidence started taking off.

About 6 months later, his customer base went from a few hundred to a few thousand. My job was to focus on the UI, making it more user-friendly and easier to use and fix existing bugs in the program. I loved and hated that time of my life because it led me to meet a wonderful woman, yet I was going through hell everyday for that tyrant. Fortunately, I took what he taught me and used it to further establish my career elsewhere.