In 1973 I used an experimental circuit design from Motorola design notes for a 200 watt solid state amplifier. I designed and etched the printed circuit boards, wound my own power transformers from defunct colour TV sets, built my own chassis and put 2 of these mono amplifiers side by side in the same box. Wish I still had it today. LOL!
Your first component that was "special"
I got into hifi 40 years ago. I had a Pioneer receiver, Kenwood table, various entry level cartridges (ADC, Stanton, Empire) and Studio Design speakers. I wound up buying a Shure V15 Type 3 cartridge. That was the first piece of gear I bought that was way beyond ordinary. I had kept the cartridge until about 2o years ago- I sold it because by then no decent replacement stylus was available. Wish I still had it.