Sing it brother. Me too.
Also was my first 180-gram reissue a couple years back. Lovin’ it. 
As someone who was already well into his personal musical development at the point that song was released, I say bravo. That was a fantastic version of the original, maybe the definitive version, and I say that as a big Van Morrison fan. 
You are now…58 years of age. Give or take a year. 
En Vogue - Funky Divas on cassette. I still have it, although I haven’t listened to it in years.
AC/DC-Back in Black
(12 years old, 1980)
It was either Rachmaninoff’s Second Piano Concerto or his Second Symphony. Or I may have bought them together.
With my own money? Santana’s debut and Abraxas on vinyl. Used, as I was less than two when they came out and this would have been ~1983 or '84 when I got a turntable. Before that I had always just taped cassettes off the radio. I was going through a pretty huge guitar-hero phase at the time. Jeff Beck, Jimi Hendrix, John Mclaughlin, more Santana and Eric Clapton soon followed in the next several weeks.
As I recall, I didn’t like the song when it first came out, but I had just picked up the a bass guitar and it seemed like an easy song to learn.
My (bass) guitar teach did manage to work out the riff and I did learn it. Well, I learned it as well as anyone that had been playing for a few weeks/months could be expected to learn it. Here it is for anyone that doesn’t recall it.
I did eventually grow into liking the song, I don’t think, at the time, that I was aware that it was a cover. That song came out when I was 14. I liked more ‘solid gold’ music in grade school, 90’s music in the 90’s and my love of classic rock (including VM) didn’t come until later on.
Maybe I was younger than the rest of you, when I plunked down my cash. It was More of the Monkees. And it was definitely because I loved the show.
AC/DC, Back in Black, when it was released, at age 9.
Sgt. Pepper. In mono (I didn’t have a stereo at the time).
Second (and first stereo record) was Urban Spaceman by the Bonzo Dog Band.
I bought West Side Story after I had seen the film in The Loop on a visit to Chicago. That year the film was nominated for eleven Academy Awards and won ten including Best Picture.
Think I nearly wore it out.
Dickie Goodman Mr. Jaws and Other Fables.
I was 6 and used my allowance money.
Probably Hotel California by the Eagles.
The Tragically Hip - In Between Evolution
I think it was Misfits by The Kinks.
Alice’s Restaurant
I was given Sunflower by the Beach Boys for Christmas in 1970, not long after it come out.
The first one I bought for myself was probably Introducing Lobo the following year (as I said in the singles thread, his was the first single I bought… ) but I had bought my sister a Seekers lp before that! (The Four and Only Seekers)
Def Leppard’s Pyromania. Still love the album. I think I’ll listen to it now.