Hereon, I will describe the experiences that determined my life.
A zoomer, I emerged in 2000.
Most of the TV shows I watched as a boy came from Nickelodeon. Early in my development, I glimpsed older Nicktoons like Catdog, Rocket Power, The Wild Thornberries, and Rugrats; however, I mainly associate my childhood with Spongebob, The Fairly Oddparents, Jimmy Neutron, and Danny Phantom. From this group I derive the most nostalgia. I remember sometime near middle school, DirecTV randomly granted me viewing access to the Nicktoons channel, which allowed me to rediscover some classic episodes that seemed to stop airing on the main Nickelodeon channel.
In late elementary school, I explored Cartoon Network and Disney Channel once I grew bold enough to channel surf and expand my tastes. Cartoon Network yielded Chowder, Flapjack, and (sadly) TDI, while Disney yielded Phineas & Ferb and Gravity Falls.
I also watched sitcoms. For Nickeloden: Drake & Josh, iCarly, Victorious, Ned's Declassified, and Big Time Rush; for Disney Channel: Wizards of Waverly Place, Good Luck Charlie, Shake it Up, and Jessie.
In 2016, VSauce's series concerning things you can "Do online now guys" (DONGs) compelled me to visit a website called YourWorldOfText.com, an infinitely-indexable, persistent set of ASCII canvases that anyone can edit. Exploring the text wastelands there interested me, but what would I do there? I committed to advertising my name on hundreds of pages and founding my own hotel, where users could claim a little square room by writing their name inside. Suddenly, while building the place, I noticed text appearing - real people interracting with my world! I scrambled to hand them their digital keys by inscribing their name outside the door, yet the flood of visitors overwhelmed me. I must have had dozens of people all searching for a room at once. Wondering where they came from, I learned that YWOT founder, Andrew Badr, featured ~/MrTheRat/Hotel on the main page of the website, and I accepted my role as a minor YWOT celebrity. I would update the hotel with additions, theme changes, and little questionnaires to keep the place active for the next year; however, I took several breaks during that time and decided to officially terminate the project in 2019.
Separately, I also tried founding an exclusive club of active YWOT users who would gather together and agree to help construct/service each other's worlds. I would then award points to users based on their contributions, starting with establishing the club. This page also got featured (albeit prematurely - I had asked to keep the world secret at first) and I had a few members before giving up.