How are you meant to use ActionScript to introduce yourself to programming? Your options are to buy or pirate Flash (CS4 is around $699US) or Flex Builder (from

How are you meant to use ActionScript to introduce yourself to programming? Your options are to buy or pirate Flash (CS4 is around $699US) or Flex Builder (from $249US). There's a few open-source tools for ActionScript but I doubt that any of the people posting on those forums are using those tools. My opinion is that most of the people using ActionScript aren't programmers. People using Flash tend to be designers (or artists, cartoonists, etc.) that need code to get their jobs done.