I think the first time I saw a computer was back in 1992. My school just purchased a few computers and we have a newly formed club called “The Computer Club”. Not wanting to miss a great opportunity of “touching” a real computer, I signed up for the club.
We were told that the computer club would be offering free computer classes for newbies (like me) so I signed up for the class. When the day finally came, I was all excited and nervous at the same time! Miss Iza, the computer tutor introduced us to new words like Alt F4, Enter, Shift, Control A etc. Like the rest of the computer newbies in the class, I jotted down every single “foreign” words that came out of her mouth. And all the fun began in the computer room.
I chose to sit at a corner table so nobody could see if I mishandled the computer. Blue screen monitor stared blackly at me. “Wow…” I thought. “I’m looking at a REAL computer!!”
It was an IBM with a 14″ monitor sitting on top of the CPU. Huge Verbatim diskette was handed to each of us. “To save your files later.” we were told. I wonder if anyone still have those at home today? *heehee*
Miss Iza then handed us a piece of paper. On the paper was printed a short story and we were required to type that into the computer. Boy was I nervous the first time my finger hit the white keyboard. I typed the first word like a pro. *BLING* It came out on the screen, just like watching a live TV!! “This is fun!” I thought. I began to enjoy the typing that I actually typed the word CINDY JANE just to see how my name would look like on the monitor! Of course, it came out on the screen and I shrieked! Somehow, I love seeing my name on it. Everyone in the computer room looked at me… they must’ve thought, “Oh my God, so sampalau..” LOL!
We also learned about new stuff like WordStar, Lotus, CPU, hard drive, IBM memory, how to print documents etc. It was a good introductory class for us (me) that when I went home, I told my parents about my computer experience and how nice it was seeing my name on the computer screen. Of course, I also managed to persuade them to buy me a brand new desktop computer. HEEEEEHEEEEE! Computers were pricey that time too.. but my parents still managed to buy me one. Thank you, mommy and daddy! 
If you were expecting something dramatic .. like maybe how I made a computer explode on my first encounter, then I’m so sorry to disappoint you. I guess my hands were pretty good with computer that so far, none of them have suffered any major damage by me. Of course I’ve had a fair share on infecting my computer with viruses, spywares, sudden shutdowns (through the main switch), deletions of important files and drivers and corrupting the Windows. No big deal, eh?
So when was your first computer encounter? And how did it turned out?
Oooh! I remember the first computer that we had! It was my sister’s. It was one of those green screen types you know? And where you had to remember the commands for DOS? Kuuurraaaaayzeeeee!!! *chuckle*
July 16th, 2007 at 1:51 am
it was when I was around 12 at school. I remember using and IBM too and I had to write something like run” …. to make it work !
But the real real computer was back in 1996, when I was 14 I guess, and it was when I started to use Internet too
July 16th, 2007 at 2:53 am
Acom : Oh yes! Yes! I remember my first encounter with DOS too. LOL!!!
Me, Myself and I: I think the first time I started to use Internet is back in 1996 too!
July 16th, 2007 at 4:51 am
Alamak.. bila ya…. like too long already. Mine the green screen one. Old DOS type. no graphic. All text. and of coz the big floppy disk. Hahaha. Those were the days.
July 16th, 2007 at 6:10 am
mine was er how old was i? can’t remember..but my dad bought one and put it in his lil office at the house..yes my dad owez got office at the house..workaholic *cough…
anyways, it’s one of those black and green screen thinggies. and yes we play game berebut rebut macam urang gila XD
my dad sent us to wordstar class before too. then we went to this place we can take IQ test *cough XD yes yes i know my dad like to boost our brains XD
July 16th, 2007 at 9:04 am
Nice post.
July 16th, 2007 at 10:19 am
My very first computer encounter was at RMIT Melbourne in 1982. It was a mainframe computer, named Cyber something. To run programs on it we have to use IBM punchcards to code our programs in FORTRAN and submit these stacks of cards to the “priests” (people operating the main frame) to get a printout of our program and results. We can also access the main frame using dumb terminals from various locations on the campus. From these terminals I learnt the art of hacking from the masters and located lots of goodies progs hidden on the main frame such as Othello game and Adventure (a text based dungeon & dragons game) and later, everyone’s passwords to the mainframe as well…
In that same year, I also met the Apple II, the Commodore Vic20 and Commodore 64. And the very first IBM PC is still 2 years away….
I guess this makes me a dinosaur here.
July 16th, 2007 at 12:12 pm
Wombat : Wow.. I don’t think I’ve heard of those…
Thanks for the computer history lesson! *heehee*
July 16th, 2007 at 2:53 pm
Mine was in Form 2 and I had to learn how to type. Software was Wordstar and there were only 6 of us in the class. Dunno why nobody wanted to learn computer those days. When I was in Form 5, they elected me as the President of the Comp. Club (Chewah!) but I was clueless of what to do with that cos I only knew Wordstar! I didn’t get my own computer until I was in college (had to lah..cos taking IT course). Sad eh?
July 17th, 2007 at 8:46 pm