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Oddly, my story sounds very similar.
Well anyway (so much for avoiding walls of text):
I can remember being aware of Kingdom Hearts from my care-free days in Carlsbad (near San Diego) when I was in my 6 to 10 years. Me and my friend never played it, but I vaugely remember seeing the comercials and hearing Simple and Clean (same for CoM), but I didn't seem to care too much. Unfortunatly, by mid spring of 2006 or so, we had to move and I had my heart-breaking goodbye with my best friend Mathies (I don't even know if I can spell his name right anymore). Once I moved up here, I mean, Pacific Grove, I spent most of my tween years trying to adjust but eventually feeling like a distant outsider away from his home, his own WORLD, with nothing left him to remember of it fondly. Then one day, in seventh grade (so I was about 12 or 13) I saw something in Disney Informer Magizine (anybody remember those?) about the Gamer of the Month (I forgot the month), some kid from Iowa who seemed to have been acknowledged with playing Kingdom Hearts II, or at least they showed a screen shot of it with the kid's picture (what's funny though, KHII wasn't even out yet, so the kid probably had the Japanese version, but I didn't know that yet). Memories (well vaude memories) of those comercials from Carlsbad started filling my head with thoughts like "Oh yeah, I think I've heard of that game, it looked pretty cool". I then started to concider an interest in that game but my standards demanded me of playing in sequental order, so of course, Kingdom Hearts 1 was first on the list. My interset also developed slightly after seeing this guy do a new game on KH1 (at least the Destiney Island bit) at our local Youth Center (he brought his own PS2 since all the center had was an X-Box and a 64). By this time I had set out on buying myself Kingdom Hearts and once I finished it I feel in love with the game and couldn't wait for the next one. One of my new friends, Chris (who ironicly moved about a year and a half after I met him) also new of the series, or at least read the manga, so when I told him about the game while I was playing it he recognized the points more or less. So when I was ready for Kingdom Hearts II, I discovered that it wasn't out yet (but by the time I got into the series it was probably already finished in Japan). So I had to wait, but that was when I began getting engaged in KH news and fan sites, so another milestone. Before it came out though, I learned of the other game I heard about, Chain of Memories, and how it supposedly took place between KH1 and 2, so I thought "Oh my God! That means I have to get that first!" But before I could even get it off of E-Bay (who doesn't love E-Bay?), my foolish little brother (foolish is my attempt to not be mean to him about it) didn't (and probably still doesn't) understand my concept of the Oringinal BEFORE the Sequel, including Everything Inbetween, so he went and rented Kingdom Hearts 2 (which was out by now) from Blockbuster and since he was still a small baby grasshopper when it came to gaming I had to take over (at first temporarly) for him and eventually got sucked in to the story ("What happended to Sora and who is this blonde haired kid!?") and eventually bought it BEFORE Chain of Memories (grumbles)! I got CoM (along with my GBA) soon after beating KH2 and I forgave my brother, but I still hold a small joke-grudge against him for that. I started playing but I could never get past Riku Replica battle 4, so I took a "vacation" from the game and watched walkthroughs of it on youtube, and only after one of my brother's friends beat him for me could I actually continue (AROS PWN'D moment XD)! But after figuring out who Namine was and the rest of Org. 13, I had the series done. Then I heard about Birth by Sleep (and by extention 358/2 Days and Coded) and that's when I got into the process of saving money for a PSP and a DS (and getting one of those flip-style phones, though now it doesn't seem like that was necessary) and when I did all I had to do was wait. Unfortunatly they were both still a ways off, so I was bored and turned to Crisis Core. Like Xemnas8 I didn't know about Final Fantasy until I started playing Kingdom Hearts, so naturally I wanted to find out more about these mysterious characters. Upon watching an over-300 video walkthrough of FFVII I began to be into Cloud more (I started FFVIII after but I got bored after watching hours of FFVII, Squall stayed as Leon to me) and I decided to play Crisis Core afterwords, and I have to say that it was a good intro into the series for me. After occupying my self for months with KH 358/2 Days (my brother's birthday came first though, so he got a Kirby game as the first DS game, grrr), Crisis Core, Dissidia, Sonic the Hedgehog (by the way, don't choose Shadow the Hedgehog as your intro to the Sonic series, even if you saw the anime first), and eventuall a PS3 download of FFVII (I haven't continued my current game actually, I'm still on "Disk" One), Birth by Sleep FINALLY came out and I played it (but not before spoiling my self via youtube) and NOW we are here in present time! I really am glade that I got into the Kingdom Hearts sereis looking back, because it held the last faintest memories of my treasued times in Carlsbad, which I will always refurr to as my childhood home. I probably still might have gotten into the series if I didn't move (apparently Mathies did) but I don't think it would have been as soon as it was when I moved. So, Kingdom Hearts feels like my last connection to the distant world to me that is Carlsbad, and I am happy as long as I have the Kingdom Hearts series. Sorry about yet anothe Wall o' Text, but with a topic like this, it should be excepted, if not expected.
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I don't remember 100% but I'm sure my brother was playing KHI back when it was released and he was playing in Hollow Bastion so after he was asleep (He never let me play when he was awake.) I played his saving and got as far as to fighting Ansem on DI. But that was the first time I'd played it, maybe after about 5 years later I replayed it and played KHII for the first time and that was when I fell in love with the game, I kept going onto the wiki for help and ways to get things, etc.
