I learned to program without having an actual computer, from a wonderful full-page magazine advert of a ZX Spectrum, just a photograph of it in glorious full co

I learned to program without having an actual computer, from a wonderful full-page magazine advert of a ZX Spectrum, just a photograph of it in glorious full colour. I didn't have access to a computer, just lots of old magazines and books. The Spectrum photo's colourful keyboard with all those interesting keywords was really inspiring to 10 year old me. Somehow, between gazing at that for hours and reading, I would dreamily imagine typing on it, and started to guess what many of the keywords meant. Being colourful, interesting, and decorated with all the keywords was super helpful. There were type-in listings in magazines in those days, as well as schematics showing how basic computers worked, so there was plenty to learn from even though they didn't specifically explain programming. Eventually I got a BBC Micro, rather than a Spectrum like most of the other boys at school. The BBC was great and is where I learned to program properly, but socially I'd go round to friends houses where we'd play Spectrum games and write little programs there. (Yes I do mean boys: I had the strong impression parents bought computers for boys but not girls in those days, and the girls didn't have any access to computers to learn from.)