@WesL I can add some perspective, but this is just from my view, and there will need to be more from others, as my memory is spotty. Brain surgery will do that to you.
I have had various other issues and haven't been around extremely active since the very early days (This domain and interface was the brainchild of former ABC 33/40 meteorologist John Oldshue aka @oldshue.) @oldshue was User #1 in the old phpBB forum. In the email conversation we had as he was starting this whole thing up, he had offered to allow me to moderate. I turned him down, knowing full well that he was going to need someone with more experience, as I was just a teenager or younger at the time. He knew this and while I was thankful he asked, I have no clue why he would ask a kid to handle such a momentous task. I guess he figured I would think it was fun, and frankly I sometimes wondered what had happened if I had agreed to it. (Sadly, I think TW wouldn't be what it has become, because Jack Watkins and others did so much better. I was sorry to see that Jack had passed.) I had watched John since he was at WDBB (which now ironically retransmits 33/40...that's so funny, because 17 and 33 were competitors). I came to know John vaguely through email because family told me that he used to live across the street, when we were at Woodridge in Tuscaloosa. John's old house eventually sold to the United Methodist Church, and there was a lead pastor from First UMC, who lived there for a time. Being the weather geek kid I was, I thought this whole thing was incredible. There was a story he told about something before I was born, which I found humorous at the time. He had one of those "kids do dumb things" moments involving a family member's car. Note that I lived *downhill* from him, and that's all I'm gonna say. Anyway, the whole thing started a conversation and eventually led into, John wanted to start a forum for the weather geeks. I don't think it had a name for the first while, and I don't remember when that actually started. whois said the domain was created in 2000, so a couple years later. The forum was linked to on 33/40's weather page and talked about rarely on the air, so it got major traction. On the old board, which I understand stuck around in various iterations until the crash of 2017, I was formerly user #12 if memory serves me. The low number was cool, but that won't matter anymore. Due to my life circumstances among other things, I didn't get along with some users earlier on, and I eventually would resort to coming and going on rare occasion. This year, I happened to be thinking about the weather season rolling in, and I was looking around to see how things were going. Hope folks are doing well. -Phil