[gtirloni]

Same here, owe him a lot it was also my first programming language (on 286's).

It's interesting that you mention GWBASIC specifically because that was also the BASIC I had access to. It doesn't seem this variant was popular in the US.

Also learned CLIPPER and created all sorts of tools and business apps. Yet another thing that seemed very localized.

[0points]

IIRC, I got GWBASIC from the official MSDOS 3.3 install discs. One had to write code using the EDLIN editor.

I live in Sweden.

PEEK and POKE:d my way to my very own computer.

[dmd]

GW-BASIC was definitely quite present in the US, being the one shipped by Microsoft with DOS up until DOS 5.