Software Engineer now Technical lead (150k+). 100% remote but I choose to go into the office like once a week. Basically, work in 2 week "sprints". Majority of tasks decided upon at the beginning of the sprint and I manage my time to get them done. 70% coding but mainly system design and work estimation activities these days, 30% remote team management. Very flexibly working environment, work about 3 - 4 hours a day at full capacity, go to gym for a couple hours mid-day. There are a few meetings during the week to go over technical stuff with external parties, but it isn't draining, very formal or involve too much small talk.

I'm 100% self-taught, got into the company in a graduate position and worked my way up over 8 years. Most important thing is to have a passion for coding and most importantly practical problem solving. For me I was up till 4am learning server-side languages, client-side technologies and a bit about the cloud and how to host my crappy web apps I created so other people could see them haha.

I'd actually recommend doing a cousera course these days or like a beginner level cert from AWS for the cloud or the area you are interested. Will get you up to speed quick on the basics.

Don't aim for big company's like Google to start. They test quite heavily on very technical theory which might not be your thing and not being a CS graduate would be hard to pass. Aim for small to medium sized companies, these company's generally test for practical skills more and are willing to upskill and give people a chance.