I most certainly wasn't a sky-god, but I was young and managed to work in aviation full time from the age of 18 so for me it's all just been part of one very big and complex journey.
So, I possibly have the most unusual route to first solo you're likely to come across.
16 hours and 23 flights in a Bulldog with the UAS, not a talented student, chopped from UAS flying training.
Through the university, 3 x 30 minute observer trips in Cranfield's Jetstream learning about flight test.
Then I discovered a microlight club during a summer job, 2 1 hour trips in a Spectrum. Loved it, plus had a vastly more sympathetic instructor than my RAF QFI.
Few more observer trips - helicopters this time, and a couple of hours crouched in the back of a VC10 cockpit.
Then back at university, managed to grab one flight in a Thruster, still enjoying it, not enough money to keep going for now.
Finally graduated, had a little bit of money. Got to solo in a total 9 flights, 8:25, with a really good microlight instructor in the Spectrum again. I think that about half that time was learning, and about half was building up the confidence destroyed by my RAF instructor a few years before.
Then changed job. Moved somewhere else, had a longish break, but went solo again in a Shadow: 9 flights and 8 hours, but in between scrounged some motorglider and glider trips through work opportunities.
Then 10 hours mixed solo and dual later in the Shadow (the famous "George" which I'm sure a few other people have flown), got my restricted microlight PPL.
Then I decided to have a go at flexwings, and did my flexwing conversion and nav to remove the restrictions on my PPL together in about another 15 hours in a Quantum then an F2a. To actually go solo on a flexwing took about 12 hours - although at the same time I also did a stack of back and right hand seat work flying in everything from a BAC1-11 to a Hawker Hunter, and whether that helped or hindered my piloting journey, I honestly don't know. Most likely it slowed me a lot in the short run, and made me a far better pilot in the long run.
G