I'd love to go back to those days... 486 with DOS and QBasic, maybe a Borland C compiler if you're lucky enough to have a local computer store that sold copies.

Myself and a friend tried to create our own version of Windows 3.1 in QBasic when we were in middle school. I wish we would have saved our progress. I don't think it was as far as long as I remember. I know it read INI files, and we could drag windows around. Not sure how much else.

OP got to learn how to program the fun way, like a lot of us did in the 90's. Grinding away at crazy side projects on old DOS systems with lots of limitations. That opportunity just isn't available to kids anymore. High powered computers are everywhere and accessible, no reason to make an old PC do new tricks. But I guess they have the web to do crazy things with, so it's not so bad.