Looking back at it though when the VIC20 first came out in 81/82, it really was the start of true home computing. For a brief period all we had back then was the calculator like Z80/81 and when the VIC20 appeared with it's 8 colours & real full size keyboard it blew the socks off everyone... 
It was a great wee machine, the first one I learned to write in "Machine Language" as it was called in them days. Too be honest I never did much on it either other than playing a few games (mainly text adventures) but it was the start of bigger things to come...
Just finished during the night restoring two of them to there former glory and have just received in the post 2 16K RAM packs I bought from evilBay for them...
I'd rather use these anyday than something CUSA has to sell...
In my part of the country you either had a VIC-20 or a ZX81. The choice was a no-brainer for me: real keyboard, good sound, colour! I also had the "Super Expander" cartridge for mine which gave it an extra 3KB of RAM, extra BASIC commands and "Hi Res graphics modes" (less said about them the better).
If nothing else, it taught you to make your code as small as possible and to reduce your text output to the screen to the bare minimum.
OUT OF MEMORY ERROR... oh, not again!
edit: Checkmark!
