I started programming in GW-BASIC on an IBM PC clone running MS-DOS. Back then, many so-called home and business computers came bundled with a BASIC interpreter, mostly made by or licensed from Microsoft. They all looked similar. You were greeted by a screen with a READY or OK prompt and a blinking cursor waiting for your input. The “screen editor” and interpreter were all in one in the true sense of the word – they weren’t bolted together like the separate text editors and interpreters/compilers we use these days…
I agree with the author that oddly Basic syntax is closer to Assembly than most languages so is an ok place to start.
I’d like to see Dijkstra write an Assembly program without JMP.
This is where I’d humorously link that maniac who wrote a program exclusively using MOV, of any amount of quotation or clarification could convince a modern search engine that “movulator” does not, in fact, mean “modulator.”