Forgot to mention...I tinkered on an acoustic around the age of 8 but never took up guitar seriously till I turned 13 because of Randy Rhoads, The Christmas of that year I got my first electric. I would play first thing in the morning, bring it to school from time to time and play during lunch hour, after my homework when I got home (Parents would not let me play it till homework was finished), and all day on the weekends. My parents had a great weapon when it came to grounding me when I misbehaved...Yup, got grounded from playing guitar.

I grew up in the 80's (A great time for learning the guitar by the way), and bugged the older guys to show me what they learned till later on I learned to read tab and had a subscription to Guitar for the practicing musician. MTV was a great motivator and inspiration to me in those days. MTV was a lot better in those days than it is today and played way better music and videos.