Wow, so many weird, yet awesome stories. XD
Honestly, the Internet has been a part of my life for so long that I doubt I could guess at the first forum I was ever on. I can tell you the first social system I ever joined and was active on was MSN Chat (got two life bans on the same account).
In regards to my avatar, I tend to create all the avatars I use, though I haven't made anything in a few years. The current one, Lady Subaru from .hack//SIGN, is part of a set to a Tsukasa signature I made when I first deployed to Afghanistan. If you consider the first avatar I EVER made:
I think it's a great improvement. Lady Subaru is my third favorite character from the .hack series.
As for changing them, I do tend to rotate my avatars and signatures, but rarely do I ever use something I didn't create myself (renders not included). Most of my works can be found at DeviantArt and PhotoBucket (plus a little extra). On anime forums, I tend to use an avatar I stole from a good friend of mine, ridorana. It's displayed on my DeviantArt page as the main image, it's Hinata from Naruto Shippuden.
I hope yall enjoyed my "story". ^^
