For my ninth birthday (I believe this was 2003) I got for my N64, three Nintendo games. I got Mario Kart 64, Mario Party, and Super Smash Bros. I got hooked on Smash Bros instantly, and played against my bothers, and we free for alled with items on. That's just what nine year olds did.
One year later, and I borrow Melee from a friend. I was like "Smash Bros. 64 who?" because it was so much better, had more characters, faster gamepley, etc,etc,etc. I played it on and off from then until 2010, (items/FFA) and couldn't play Brawl because the Wii I owned didn't support it. By the end of 2010, the gamecube was broken. There was a period of time where I completely abandoned Smash from 2010 until the beginning of 2012.
For Christmas 2011 (Basically 2012) we got a Wii (Our old one broke and we never bothered to get a new one. Like I said, I'd abandoned Smash to pursue other hobbies) and Brawl, and I devoured it. I didn't like the slow speed, but I eventually got used to it. Sometime during then, I discovered the existence of the competitive community. Until 2012, I literally had no idea that people played this series anything other than in their houses or online. I never knew that tournaments and tier lists existed. I got excited and started playing Brawl competitively with people via WiFi, and continued this until late November 2013, where I finally decided to get Project M 2.6b.
I immediately loved it more than Brawl. I remembered why I had so much fun with Melee. About a week later, 3.0 was released, and I never looked back. Now, I've got 20 people on my friends list, and even made a Facebook group dedicated to solely Project M and the trading of codes/discussion.
The story doesn't end here though. To this day, I've never played against any human player other than through WiFi, with the exception being my brothers four years ago with free for all items. I recently found a group that plays Melee/Project M in Central Florida, and many of them live in the same city. I look forward to playing competitive Smash offline for the first time since I became a Smash Bros. player 11 years ago. It'll be another great chapter in the story of my Smash experience.