How did you first encounter Tolkien's works?

When I was little, I saw the animated "Hobbit" in a video store. It looked interesting, but my mom wouldn't rent it because she said it would spoil the book for me when I read it. Not too long after that, when I was about 7, my aunt gave the book to me as a birthday present. When I got to the first sentence, I demanded to know what a hobbit was. My mom just told me to continue reading. Obviously, Tolkien explained what a hobbit was. I loved the book, and wanted to read LotR as soon as possible but my mom said I was too young to fully appreciate it (I probably was). A year later, at about 8, I started Fellowship. I couldn't put the book down! I would stay up all night reading just to find out what happened. After I was done, I quickly decided it was my favorite book. I tried to get everyone I knew interested in it. I read the first two LotR books out loud to my little brother. (By the time we got to RotK, it had been a year and I was tired of it so he never got to hear that one ) I convinced all my friends to read it. Few of them got past The Two Towers. One didn't even make it past the first chapter of "Hobbit"! Of course, I was probably starting them too early but I didn't realize it at the time . Ok, now that you've listened to my boring story... When did you first encounter Tolkien?