Re: You are Here! So: How did you get into Apple II Computing?

[!smentzer@ecom.net (Steve Mentzer)]

Well, 

I was 10 years old, and working on the old TRS80 Model III machines in my 
elementary school writing simple BASIC programs, and sucking up as much 
information as I could. Shortly thereafter, my uncle gave me a used commodore 
VIC20 machine and a b/w TV to use. That is where things REALLY took off. 

I used the VIC20 for a year or two, and when I was in 7th grade, the same uncle 
sold me his Apple IIe for $1200.00. This included a monitor III, dual disk 
drive and the 64k base unit with a generic Z80 card. I mowed lawns, did chores, 
babysat and did all sorts of stuff to get that money together. Best money I 
have *ever* spent in my life.

I started to learn pascal at that point (apple/ucsd pascal). I spent an ungodly 
number of hours working on that machine. Learning appleworks and ACOS, pascal 
and BASIC, a little assembly, and playing some of the best games *ever*. 

The real turning point for me was when a friend let me borrow his 1200 baud 
prometheus promodem. Wow. The BBS craze really hit home for me at that point. 
Suddenly, I had a real interest in telecomputing. What a new world to 
explore.... and I got to pick a cool handle "Mr.Scary".

I purchased turbo pascal/CPM and continued to work on that. My programming 
skills gradually got better. By the 9th grade, I was writing some pretty cool 
apps (which really pale by today's standards), but back then were pretty neat.

I kept my IIe and continued to upgrade it (to 128k, color monitor etc) and in 
1989, I purchased my first IIgs (a ROM03 of course), which was eventually 
fitted with an AI 20 meg HD, TWGS, PCTransporter and other assorted goodies.

The amount of money I sunk into it makes me cringe.

I ran the "Dream Zone BBS" and "Mr.Scary's" neighborhood off the IIgs for a 
couple of years before I moved to arizona, sold the IIgs for next to nothing, 
and bought an IBM PC/XT compatible (Amstrad machine) for $500.00. I then 
learned "C" and 80x86 assembly...

And the story goes on.....

smentzer@ecom.net