I can follow some written Spanish, as in a couple of Cormac McCarthy’s books but that’s about it. I used to be able to make myself understood, after a fashion, in Spanish because of a friend who was of Mexican descent-----but I’ve lost that ability. I never could follow spoken Spanish with a very few exceptions, most of which involved cursing.
shlemiel
shlamazel
shmaltz
schmuck
shmooze
shlep
shikse
shmutz
shtick
I fall into the category of people who “don’t know a word of Spanish.” I took French in high school and Russian in college. There were no Hispanics where I grew up.
It is probably somewhat unusual for someone in America literally not to know a word of Spanish. I can count the fingers on one hand, I can say “hand,” along with a few other words, most learned via the movies, and I know a nice selection of bad words–still, I couldn’t order a taco in Mexico City.
As far as being able to claim to “speak” a bit of some language, I can understand enough French and Russian to get most of anything used as brief bits in an English-language movie, and with a dictionary I can generally translate a news story in Russian on the web. I don’t consider any of this significant language skill.
My standard on “speaking” these languages is that I know enough of each to get into trouble with a native speaker, but not enough to get back out again. It’s a good rule of thumb.