I have been obsessed with spanking since I was 4 years old, maybe even younger. Growing up in the 1970s/80s spanking was nearly universal. My first memory was a discussion between me, my babysitter (12f), and another boy (8m) about how our dads spanked us. We all got spanked on our bare bottoms, much to my delight when I pictured my babysitter getting it. The other boy got the belt over the bad, while my babysitter and I similarly got it OTK by hand. Hard to say if this discussion was what started my fascination, or what made me realize it. From that day forward, I was obsessed with seeing, hearing, or hearing stories about spanking. Unfortunately I was very shy to begin with, and knew that being too interested in spankings was perverted, so I often pretended to be uninterested or even repulsed by spanking stories.
All that being said, spankings were a deterrent and very effective with me and kept me out of trouble. I absolutely hated getting them, despite my fascination, and avoided them at all costs. So as a result, I was a relatively well behaved kid.
I kept my fascination to myself, but started to kind of test the water in young adulthood with suggestions and discussions. I was still sure I was the only person to like spankings the way I liked them... the purely disciplinary and ritualistic type and not just some form of foreplay. To me sex and spanking are not in the same realm. Spanking can be erotic, but isn't always.
After the internet allowed me to discover that I wasn't alone, I started meeting people into spanking and playing. I credit my first spanko girlfriend who was very outgoing and had lots of friends for helping me to become more outgoing myself, and meet many ladies and gentlemen over the years into spanking. Our pictures are floating around the web to this day, and still come up on web searches (faces cropped out).