I never played Commander Keen, or Wolfenstein 3D, or even Doom, which were all before my time. But when all my friends were getting high speed internet and playing the newest FPS games online, I dreamed of the day I'd have a computer good enough and connection fast enough to join in on the fun. Then one of my older family friends gave me his old copy of Quake 3 Arena, and suddenly I was thrown into this unbelievably fun world of online death matches. Even on my weak family desktop, I could play the game with good FPS. This was my first real interest in computers.
Then when I started programming and learning the history of the field, I of course came across the Id team and connected the dots between my first online gaming experience, programming, and how Id created these games with it. It's been one of those magical "good old days" of programming culture that I look back on for inspiration and motivation and why I like this field so much.