my first computer was a Commodore 16. I actually wanted a C64, but my grandfather accidentally bought the C16, because he thought it was the same and he didn´t want to spend the extra money just for different color
There were almost no C16 games available in the small town i lived in and only few kids i knew had a compatible system, so i had to start coding myself if i wanted to do anything with the machine. As you might remember, there was also no internet and learning material was a scarce resource (i did not speak or read english at the time which made it even worse), so after i read through everything i could get my hands on and wrote all the basic programs i was interested in at the time, i finally switched to the C64. That got me busy enough for some time, so i skipped the 16-bit era altogether. Also i fell i love with programming which i still my passion (and also my occupation).
After quite a few years of MS DOS, Windows 95, Linux, Mac and mobile coding i finally came back home to 8-bit computing. I bought most of the hardware i so desperately wanted when i was young and started collecting and repairing old machines.
I love the recent boost in popularity of the old 8-bit systems, even though it does make it harder to afford them. However, it makes me feel less weird when i'm not the only one around
And that brings me to the Commander X16 (and other modern 8-bit machines). I can't say how thrilled i am that people actually put in the time and effort to create these things! I hope that i get my hands on the actual hardware soon (the emulator is great and all, but there's nothing than the real deal imho)...