Sometime around 1990, TSR lost its magic. By that time, its products were not driven by the former passion of its staff, but greed and the need to stay on top by its management - no matter how much it harmed the company or its image.
Before then, things were mostly grand! I was in over my head when I got the Holmes basic set, but I was gleestruck when I got my hands on the B/X set (only to be a little dismayed when instead of Companion we got BECMI). For my 8th grade graduation present, I was able to get myself the PHB, DMG & UA* from Toys'R'Us - along with an unhealthy amount of LJN D&D action figures... My friends introduced me to the looniness of Gamma World, the (disappointing because it wasn't anything like Star Wars, but hey - it was sci-fi) Star Frontiers games and the awesomeness of Marvel (which replaced our V&V games for the short term).
Greyhawk, Dragonlance, Ravenloft, Forgotten Realms, Dark Sun, Spelljammer - all were campaign worlds that wormed their way into my mind as they knocked the doors down for what you could do with this little game.
The 90's weren't good for TSR, and looking back, its easy to track their downfall - along with so many others that would suffer a similar fate - Sears, Toys'R'Us, K-Mart, Radio Shack, just to name a few. But for a short, brilliant time in my life, all was good with the world, and it was damn fun.
*Note: I didn't get the MM until about 3 years later, until then I used the FF & the monster stat section in the DMG.