For my birthday in 7th grade, I wanted a TI-86 calculator because I could program on it. And maybe because a classmate showed me ASM games on their TI-83+.

In 9th grade, I wrote programs to solve specific kinds of algebra problems while showing the step-by-step "work" on screen. I remember realizing a critical bug in the code during an exam, which surprised me because it worked perfectly for all the homework and study questions.

I ended up spending more time trying to fix it than working on the test! I now realize that it was my first experience with a P1 production bug. In a way, it was my math teacher's fault for not providing sufficient acceptance criteria. I was supposed to learn about polynomials, but I (also) ended up learning about edge cases.

Same here, got started via the TI-83+ manual, started out building simple menu based games & homework helpers. Eventually moved on to learn z80 assembly and build a few simple games. Interestingly now I focus on mobile development. I always loved having the ability to take something I built and carry it around in my pocket.

Same, but it was a TI-84, and the game was tic-tac-toe with a perfect "ai" that would let you enter "number of players: 0" [1]

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s93KC4AGKnY

Mine was a TI-81 and a clone of Scorched Earth with multiplayer, realistic physics, wind, random terrain generation, etc. Used all 2.4kb and every single named variable provided by TI-BASIC on the machine.