I didn't really learn SQL until being given small tasks at work that involved some basic scripting. Requests for populating tables with new data so admins wouldn't have to manually input it from the web UI was a common one. That in particular was helpful because:

1. Performance is not usually as important for one-time scripts like these.

2. It gets you familiar with your database and the relationships between entities in your product.

3. It shows you how powerful SQL is. With a few hours writing a single script, I saved users many more hours that would've been spent entering it all manually.

The other benefit of this approach, it's easier for senior developers to review too. You can give feedback like, "this works fine for this use-case, but here's something you can do in situations where performance is a concern" and provide some useful tips in PR comments.