I was about 12 and had learned some BASIC from copying programs from magazines when my dad got a Pascal ROM. I just couldn't understand how a program could work

I was about 12 and had learned some BASIC from copying programs from magazines when my dad got a Pascal ROM. I just couldn't understand how a program could work without line numbers! Computers were really an invitation to learn programming because they booted instantly and you could try out commands even without actually writing a program. And there wasn't much more you could do: there were no browsers and messengers and other things to take your attention. It's hard for a 12 year old to take up programming on today's machines.