I give all you a huge Thumbs up.  To learn on your own means your the teacher.  You got homework.  You do it.  Hard work.  At the end, your learned something you want to do and love it. 

The director...romper room.. I vaguely remember that... and oh my, you did Radio and TV. Cool! So that is where you got started. My first puppet transmission was on local TV too. Got told off for it . What happened to your public access TV series? ...and you didn't have the confidence back then? ( that seems to still be lingering even now...  )   go for it I say!   ...and That's a fact.
Squirrely.. yep, I agree with you, totally.