Do you remember when and what helped you discover your affinity for furries? If you do, I'd like to hear your stories!
To get the ball rolling I'll start with mine. While I certainly can't pinpoint the exact date I became fixated on anthros, I can absolutely remember getting Sonic Adventure on the Dreamcast when I was 7 or 8 (2000ish).
Seeing Tails was all I needed to get hooked, and want to be a cool fox like him. I didn't even have a word for it until I started using the internet years later, but my furry fate was sealed from then onward. It was the catalyst that got me into fantasizing about having fur and a big tail, and got me doodling lots of Sonic art as a kid. While I've long since stopped making Sonic art, Tails still holds a special place in my heart over 20 years later.
What planted the seeds was probably the Sly Cooper games on the PS2 or the re-runs of Swat Kats I would catch on Boomerang in the mid 2000's
I always liked anthro characters but I thought the idea of making a whole fandom about it was dumb and pointless as I just saw it as another type of character, so I didn't actually accept the label until like, a year ago (I'm 25 lol)