I started in photography with an Argus C3 in the summer of '73. That September I got a used Minolta SRT-101 for my Bar Mitzvah. After college, when I no longer had access to a darkroom, my photography hobby went dormant for about 25 years until I replaced a stolen point and shoot digital with a Pentax DSLR.
With a real camera, and the control from processing the photos myself, my enjoyment of photography returned, with 25 years of compounded interest.