I remember those days well. I used to post even then under my current name until someone else registered my name and never used it. A few weeks later, their system crashed and all data was lost. as soon as it came back up, I registered under my name and have kept it ever since.
I don’t remember names well, but I do remember personalities somewhat. I do remember a guy, from New Hampshire I believe, a Physics professor that liked to sample beers from all over the world and posted a lot on rant and rave. He was a hoot, but a tad bit arrogant.
Rant and Rave was a lot of fun. The repair advice hasn’t actually changed much in 15 years. I used Bob as my first forum name but it was purloined in the first forced registration and I added p, I seem to recall that Amazon was in charge of that first stir up. Bobp was hijacked somehow in a later rehashing of the forum and I picked up HI, which I used until the forum went totally into the hole for some time. I don’t actually understand why anyone would operate a bulletin board forum such as this. Can the advertising at the margins cover the costs?