My mother sewed when I was a child, but she was far too busy to show me. Like others, I first learned on a treadle machine. I always sewed a little by hand, darning socks, sewing the seam on my little brother's flannel diapers. Lol! Gosh, that just came back to me. Cutting and sewing white flannel for diapers. Long ago. Necessity, as you said.
In my career, i worked with troubled people, and I often found that people who retired with few hobbies or interests in their lives often struggled with depression and anxiety afterward. With retirement looming, I went searching for things I enjoyed from the days when I HAD free time, and remembered that I once sewed and darned, and embroidered.
i took it up again and loved the peace of it. I can do it all day, and I don't know where the day has gone. I feel productive and content when I make quilts.