The chronological order was VisiCalc, then Lotus123, then Excel. Microsoft had a spreadsheet tool called Multiplan during the era of Lotus123, but it didn't get much traction.
As a side note, VBA has been added to Excel only after version 4, before that there was only a Macro language.
If you want to feel how an ol' version of Excel behaved (without many bells and whistles and of course without the ribbon) there is an exceptionally good little program here:
that has most functions and fits (the 32 bit Windows version) in a single (portable) file hust below 1,500,000 bytes.
And, JFYI, the sad part is that I wrote my fifth "I love you":
>One “I love you” for every year since I’ve fallen in love with...Microsoft Excel?
in 1994 or 1995.