I'm a full stack dev and started in high school with a Geocities site (I feel a bit dated by that) and have grown my skills from there. I believe in learning to use my tools well before adding new ones and with so much choice out there I feel that's one piece of advice I'd give to new recruits, pick 1 core technology per area (front, back DB) that you can learn and understand deeply, do this before you add in any code automation or fancy external tools to work for you. For me that's .net, jquery and SQL server, for you that might be something else like php and mySQL.

my core stack and skills:

• ASP.Net
• JQuery / Javascript
• SQL Server / TSQL
• Windows server / Azure cloud Services
• Ladder logic

Personally I love board games, astronomy and learning about how stuff works with a hot cup of tea.