Anyone else who tried out smoking (tobacco) when young and just failed to see the point?

This is what happened to me.

Certainly. My parents were smokers, so of course I surreptitiously tried it.

It was unpleasant, so I did not continue. And at school I was one of the nerds, not the in-crowd, so social peer pressure wasn’t much of a thing.

Very glad I never picked up the habit!

I must have anti-addiction receptors in my brain. My mom smoked, and (because of the TV commercials) I wondered if I stood next to her when she smoked, I could get transported along with her to Marlboro Country. It looked like a fun place. It never occurred to me that I could just smoke my own and go there.

In first grade I grabbed a candy cig and affected a James Dean pose. I had no idea who James Dean was, or even that I was emulating him. Behold the power of advertising! But it did not take.