I studied Computer Science at university - we called it CompSci. I’d always been interested in computers and I enjoyed learning more about how they work and how to think about programming them. Some of the classes I enjoyed were Operating Systems, Networking, and Distributed Systems.

I’d taught myself programming because I wanted to make videogames, although now thirty years later I still haven’t made any videogames! (Although several of my classmates had never done any programming before, so it wasn’t a requirement.) I chose CompSci because I already enjoyed programming, and also because I thought it would be easier than Physics or Engineering, which were other subjects I was interested in. My CompSci classes turned out to be mostly theoretical and not involve much actual programming, but I’ve heard American universities set more programming homework than English ones do.

These days I’m a professional software engineer, and really enjoy writing code for a living. I don’t do much computer science in my day to day work - most programming doesn’t involve that much theory - but the degree did teach me useful concepts like how the internet works and how to design programs to be fast.