I started 9 days before my 19th birthday. I had read about it months before in a Gamepro and just happened to see it on a shelf one day while at a store. Picked it up and said goodbye to my social life, except rare occasions, for the next several years.

I did get most of my friends hooked, definitely makes you feel good to know one of them flunked out of college playing so much.

The good ole days!

I started playing in I think in 2000 shortly after kunark came out. My friends gave me the original game so I could play with them before kunark but I didn't have a 3d card in my parent's PC. So i built my own computer(amd k6-2 system) and got completely sucked in. I was 15 at the time and made a dwarf warrior. I believe getting involved in everquest and the raid scene on Bristlebane helped make me more community minded and willing to step up to the challenge of "making shit happen" instead of waiting for someone else to get the party started. With velius I joined Crimson Blades and fought our way up to Ntov raids, eventually being the 3rd guild to ever complete the ring of vulak. That ring event was so much fun to figure out, getting wiped each new wave because we had no idea what was going on, having no idea how many waves there were. When vulak finally poped it was amazing.
The guild leader, Aaria, was a prefect example of a cult of personality. when she leaned people followed, so when she decided to take a break from leadership and join up with the circle of legends (pop era) the rest of the guild had to move with her. Once in CoL with a following like hers she seemed to immediately become an officer and though she wasn't the leader of the guild, she is who we followed :)

<----- about to flunk from playing too much

I was 27. My buddy's brother had been in the beta, so they both had the game on the first day. I watched him play a bit, then played all night after he went to bed. This is still the best MMO, hands down. I've tried most other MMO's since then, but none capture the magic this one has.

I was 30, I was in prison for 12 years for attempted murder. I was looking for something to relax me when i got out since I had so much anger being in the pen so long, and was looking for a game that had to do with killing, but was more passive, so this game fit me well.