I was watching someones slideshow showcase on YouTube of their cities which is what got me to downloading CC other than the NAM. I think the first BAT I downloaded was a Walmart.

So I went 5 years without CC, because I started playing in 2003. It wasn't really until 2008.09 when I downloaded CC that I really started playing the game heavily. TS2 took up all my gaming time before that, and now TS3 as well.
I can understand about the username thing. From The Sims 2 to The Sims 3, I didn't continue on under my former username. Started fresh, with a name that also sounded better. I make no parallels to my old name.