Hi Neo...
Brilliant!

Hi samthewildon...
(Apologies for typos, etc...)

I back everything Neo has said.
I am an amateur coder, I do it as a serious hobby, but when I first started coding it was on a Sinclair Spectrum using its default BASIC.
I had a Sharp MZ80K before that but its BASIC was convoluted, and initially put me off coding entirely.
However Sinclair BASIC was idiot proof, syntax errors were impossible as any line with one could not be entered directly or into a _script_.
This meant any errors were coding ones, mine and mine alone.

As an electronics engineer I decided to write a testcard program for the Spectrum, it took me a while but by trial and error I learnt things like, simple loops and decision statements. I wrote other testing snippets too for my professional work.
Well although it wasn't perfect it worked and this is what got me into hammering hardware, because drawing in the Spectrum's border was very, very limited in BASIC.
So I decided to learn Z80 assembly, I was told this was FAST, and it was a revelation. I bought a commercial assembly compiler, (by HiSoft).
It turned out that because of learning BASIC, Z80 assembly coding became second nature; and, the result being I started drawing inside the border crosshatch lines and colour bars.
This transformed my testcard and became my standard, FREE CRT alignment tool until I got my AMIGA which got me into ANSI C, a language I don't use much at all now.

I STILL code in BASIC in various platforms for quick and dirty stuff, as proof of concept for an idea.

I have coded serious stuff for the AMIGA, including an AudioScope with a full non-standard GUI which is probably my best piece of work and that was finished in 2001.
I was proficient in Python and a few other languages and all but abandoned them now in preference to UNIX shell scripting, although even after 6 years I am still only scratching at its surface as it is SOOO flexible.
When I joined in Jan 2013 I bragged about doing an AudioScope in text-mode shell scripting and it is still going on here, six years later.

SO, find something that you are interested in that requires software and start learning, words like mutable, immutable will appear in your vocabulary which I didn't know 15 years ago until I started with python. Python is a powerful language and has a library for just about EVERYTHING you need coding wise.

My pet love is coding stuff that a language was not designed to do and I have gotten the shell to do lots. I am now considering doing AudioScope in 'dash' but that might be a step too far with my POSIX compliance knowledge at present.

You do not need a maths and/or computer science doctorate, just an accepting mind and the ability to logically create code, BUT, most of all, patience and LOTS of practice.

Bazza...