Spot on observations. Your mother did it right. Do the same thing for your child.
We do something similar with our 20-mo old. We're less hardcore about the TV^WNetflix thing than your mother. If he wants to watch Eeebee or Old MacDonanld he tells us and we let him (within reason).
About 4 weeks ago, he learned to play with Duplo building blocks (which we've had for several months), and he almost never asks to watch TV now. We estimate he used to watch about 6 hrs/week before.