This is something I talk all the time with students that are being taught all the programming classes in college. Most of them know how to program, or at least know the syntax of a language and know basics, but getting to that tipping point of having hacked something up is kinda hard for most people. After you've built that first thing, that isn't the obvious programming exercises found on textbooks, you've passed that tipping point and hacking will then come naturally to you.