I remember all those constraints, but I think for me, it was a really good thing, because it helped me understand the reason for the more complicated features o

I remember all those constraints, but I think for me, it was a really good thing, because it helped me understand the reason for the more complicated features of real programming languages. I knew cramming things into lists or strings was a kludge. But before I had learned TI-BASIC, I had attempted to learn C and JavaScript. Back in the 90s, I feel like most books on programming in stores were more like language reference manuals than instructional books. It was like, "here is every feature, good luck to you". After TI-BASIC, I was like, oh, I see why being able to dynamically allocate memory is so great. I see why explicit function parameters are so great. I see why return values are great. Et cetera. But what really did it for me was learning Z80 assembly. That gave me an understanding of pointers, memory architecture, system calls, build process, toolchain, and so forth. Between the two very different calculator programming experiences, I was finally primed to be able to learn C.