I'm in your same age bracket (a bit older actually) and joined Internet mid-90's and there were already plenty of trolls and nasty, mean people. They were just fewer in absolute numbers because statistics.

Also, as youngsters, we probably tolerated those that were there much more - at least if the trolling wasn't directed at us - because teenagers are still learning life and emotions.

I bet when you were about 22 plus or minus a couple years music started to change for the worse too!