Yeah, I know. I started around 13. I totally taught myself with books and vids. I used to travel with my grandparents all over the U.S. and Canada, and fly fishing was really an awesome sport to get involved in with such good places to fish. I'm 33 now, and living in AZ just ruins the whole fly fishing thing. This state sucks for it, so I stopped a few years back even messing with it.
Btw, I was extremely good at casting and doing everything one needed to be good at it. I'll never forget the Green River in Utah and the little store up the road telling people to use the usual generic Elk Hair Caddis, Royal Wulff, and others. When I got there a dozen or so people below the dam were fishing like crazing and not catching a damn thing. I did a little detective work and discovered the fish were going crazy for some tiny white bug. Pulled out one like it and BAM! It was no longer fun to even try. Every cast was a catch. I was only about 15 and the adults were the usual assholes - "You better not keep that!" "You must be using bait" Blah blah blah.
Once they realized I was C&R and on the up and up, they wanted to know what I was using. I just told them a black ant!