It wasn't the money, it was the ostracizing. I was bullied mercilessly for years and my only retreat was the inside. Computers were the most entertaining thing, so spending a lot of time on it, made me good at it.

Nobody knows what I sound like, smell like, look like, etc. online. I could delete this account right now and pop up with a new one - to anybody but the admins, it'd be like a new person showed up. Also: I can leave whenever I like.

Semi-related: opensource is great too. If something doesn't work, I can try and fix it. If the maintainer(s) doesn't want it/can't integrate it, a new fork can be created (soft or hard).

Finally, it's cheap. No need to buy expensive equipment, materials, space, pay teachers, or have a team.