I was checking Eric Noah’s page multiple times daily in the pre-3e era. We were really tired of 2e, and the simplicity of 3e’s core sounded very exciting!
I faithfully compiled Eric’s playtest/preview leaks into an ever-evolving document, and added in the “Start Playing 3e Now” bits from Dragon each month.
My DM at the time wasn’t interested in trying 3e, but a couple of us made a few characters and tried out some encounters using those leaked rules.
Living in Madison WI at the time, I kept wondering if any of us had ever met Eric at Pegasus Games or wherever, as I knew he was a teacher in the area. (We hadn’t, afaik.)
I didn’t really involve myself in the message boards or register here til a bit later, when moving left me temporarily gameless.