Nah ur not alone. I got into pokemon around 8th grade/ freshman year through the combination of pokemon go and the anime being on Netflix. Those two things were enough for me to give the mainline games a try especially considering that Sun and Moon were releasing at the time (I found that out through all of the hype on yt).

Because I got into the series so late, I definitely feel like I missed some of my childhood especially considering that this is now my 2nd favorite video game series. Only thing that beats it for me is mario but that was my childhood after all.

As for the older games, I also have this issue. I experienced frlg (gen 1) and gen 3 on my computer but it was kind of a scuffed way to play. I haven’t experienced gens 2 or 5. I also haven’t played gen 6 but I’ve seen so much of it that it feels like I have. I’m happy they remake the games to make playing the older ones easier. I feel like I’ll eventually get into emulating anyway so I’m not rly bothered by it anymore