I started in the days when there were a million replays that came with the game like kageonemillionpunch(which I thought was ridiculous), and a bunch by [Torigod]Patrick. He was like my fucking idol back then.
I also found it super hard to make tc since I didn't know about the forums or market, so I just played in tournaments. I got like 3k until I got somewhat bored with the ingame and took a break. About 8 months later I picked it back up and did some low-tier marketing, and picked up enough money for like 3 128x128 textures. I bought them symmetrically over like a month of tournaments and marketing until I eventually reached full. Damn I was proud.
Later I joined Nexus, that fell apart (but was fun) so I co-created X with a few people and that lasted a while, but they went inactive. About a month later I was invited to Heck, so I joined.
Still a noob, btw. Think I'm 3rd or 4th dan, dunno.