23 years old here and it was my interest in military history that got me into these games.
The first wargame I played, although I wasn't aware of it, was CC2 in 1998 or 1999. It wasn't the full game but the demo that came with Flight Simulator 98. Played the hell out of it. After that I didn't play any wargames or sims, except FS, until 2001 when a mate introduced me to the Operation Flashpoint demo. I was blown away by the realism it had compared to most other military shooters and I never looked back. Sill playing that series with Arma 2 and ACE mod.
2006 was the year I got back into wargames when I bought some old CC titles. Then 2007 came along with CMSF which I happened to come across by accident. Own every single CMx2 title for PC.
So now I mostly split my time between Arma 2, CMx2 and the odd wargame or flight sim.