I was introduced to the scene at 15 and was active in it until about 17. Too young to travel to proper demo parties, but old enough to contribute code and music, and to enjoy the demo disks that came in the mail after a swap party.

It's interesting to rationalize it as an art form today. It sounds reasonable, but I don't think I or my friends thought of what we were doing as art, at the time. We were trying to impress each other with things that looked cool. To the extent that art was involved, yes, we needed music and graphics and fonts and creative designs, but we did these things out of necessity, without calling ourselves composers or graphic artists or type designers or art directors. Watching what others sent you and contributing your own stuff created a sense of belonging which I feel was really the primary motivator for my friends and me.

Regarding tools, there was one thing that was frowned upon in my circles: the use of demomaker software. These point and click apps allowed people to call themselves demo makers even though they did nothing technical. Boo!