MS-DOS QBasic was basically the “starter kit” for coding in the ‘90s, baked right into MS-DOS 5.0 in 1991 after replacing the old GW-BASIC. It was this lightweight, no-frills programming environment where you could jump in, type some code, and actually see stuff happen—games, calculators, even weird little experiments—without installing anything else. QBasic got small updates alongside DOS through 6.22 in 1994, but it never became a full compiler; it was more like a sandbox that taught a generation how to problem-solve with code. If you remember firing up QBASIC.EXE and loading “Gorillas” or “Nibbles,” you know the vibe—simple tools, endless hours of tinkering.