For me, the etmyology (and context) of "script kiddies" laid within mIRC warscripting. Lots and lots of proto-hacker troublemakers creating various low-level ICMP attacks, ping floods, and so on.
Timeline is generally about the same time as well.
Timeline is generally about the same time as well.
Due to the time-frame and the crowd I hung out with at the time, i can definitively say that was between '94 and '97.
I would find it very hard to believe that Australian high schoolers were at the bleeding-edge however, no matter how advanced we were, which tells me the real origin of the term must be significantly earlier than that...
Very few people with full time jobs had the time to be super active in the 'scene'. It was almost entirely highschool and college students.