Bought my 1st record when I was 8-10 yr5s old. That was 1959-61. Got $2 allowance and bought 2 45's every week. I've loved music all my life. I had a turntable console of some sort. I have never been without a music playing system since then. I had a lot of low fi but the music has always been the important part to me. Got my 1st good system in 1978 while in Charlotte NC. A new Harmon Kardon HK 730 receiver, Big Advents and a Tecchnics TT. later I added a Teac 3 head cassette player. I made many cassette tapes from LP to listen in the car.It was a great starter system. Then I tried a Luxman R115 receiver. I hated it. It had nothing but THUMP for a bass line. Sold it and got the HK running again along with Infinity RS 5 speakers. Add a Maggot box cdb 650 along the wayand I was happy until about 2000. Thats when I decided to reach higher.
I found audiogon & audio asylum and learned a lot. I learned that audiophiles mostly listen to funny music. Well...at least its funny to me. I never knew anyone who listened to female vocals & jazz. I tried jazz & just don't get it. but what I do get is NOS music. My new systems have opened the door to music UI never was interested in before. I was a hard rock/metal guy. But softer stuff like Billy Joel, Supertramp, Elton john, etc sound pretty darn good on a good system. Acoustic music in general sounds good. So I have a lot of NOS music to listen to now. This is stuff I heard on the radio but would never have thought about buying before. Its been a great learning experience. The audiophiles I met early on were very helpful in teaching me. My system was far inferior to others but they never made me feel bad about my system. The early internet experience was quite a bit different that today. I had a good experience and will never forget those who helped me along the way.