During my studies in Graphic Design about 1999 to 2005 I somehow got involved in interactive media. First just designing interface elements, like icons and stuff.
Actually, during my first design job I wanted to add behavior to the gui. That was a start: I needed to learn Actionscript in order to achieve the desired behavior.
So, what I considered to be waaay to advanced for me proved to be easy enough for me. Admitted, with the help of some code snippets and perhaps following really bad practices.
The success of that project encouraged me to go on, everytime learning the exact stuff I needed to express my creativity (still regarding myself as a designer). Also, the need for little helper tools (like a Spam-Filter for a web based mail client or some greasemonke scripts to sort stuff out) got me trained in Javascript.
By the time I started learning Javascript advices were given which are considered bad practice by today. Some of them I am aware of, but the ones I'm not I could not know :)
Today, I am working as a professional Web Designer / Frontend Engineer and provide training to the junior colleagues. Rather than just passing on what I have learned a decade ago, I want to be a good tutor to them. That's why I'm subscribing to the basics first.
Perhaps I can also participate by helping others.