I could have posted this comment verbatim! (Except mine was a TX.) I was poor growing up and couldn't afford a computer and it changed everything when I got the Tandy. My mother was a hairdresser. She got to talking to one of her clients about me and, long story short, her client gave me the Tandy along with a bunch of manuals and programming books. She also came to our apartment and got me started on it. Even showed me the internals. I owe a great deal to that woman!

Same, but mine was a Tandy 1000 SL/2. Taught myself DOS, BASIC, Turbo Pascal, some Assembler.

Got a 1200bps modem and discovered BBSes, got a wardialer, discovered an unsecured university dial-in and started learning the internet. There were no commercial ISPs back then and no web. It was all text-mode: gopher, archie and veronica, usenet, ftp. Finding text files of the old 2600 and Phreak magazines and the Anarchist's Cookbook felt so cool. Then I found MUDs and IRC.

The T1000 could play all the hot games at the time, flight sims, Sierra adventure games, etc., with better graphics and sound than other computers. But there was just something special about playing a text-mode MUD with hundreds of other people from all over the world.

That was an incredible experience as a teen.

I use to play F-19 on my HX that had an upgrade board. I also loved a horse racing game on that thing but I can't remember what it was called.