Growing up, I just could not figure out how people "worked". My parents thought I was lonely all the time; however, my inner world was (and still is), so rich that it's difficult to express to people. Thus, I made it a conscious effort to study people as I would any of my other subjects. Now, unless I tell people -- they would have no idea. Everything I do in social interactions, in order to fit in, is a learned behavior that I didn't pick up until my university years.
I'm in my 30s now and still learning. We joke about it, but my girlfriend regularly tells me that I have "no emotions." Truth is, I just react differently than what's expected. Even this very day, she asked me a question about love, and I sat there and thought for a few seconds and tried to give her a logical answer. Of course, I was playfully scolded for not answering right away, but this is par the course for how I see the world.
It's difficult to know when people just want a canned response, or when they want an actual answer.