My Mom was a good cook, as was her mother. Since my mother worked split shifts and was gone at night, my Dad did a a lot of the cooking too, and while he said "Susan learned to cook out of self defense." because of his cooking, we 3 kids did not starve from his cooking. His mother was a good cook, although she did not enjoy the art of cooking, and was a fairly basic cook. I do remember some cookies she made once that were soft and wonderful... Kind of like a puffy Sugar Cookie. And while not all of my 3 boys WANT to take the time to cook, they all can, and 2 of the 3 are good cooks.
My maternal Grandmother passed her brownie recipe down to her Granddaughters, and I can tell you that most of us do not make them because they never turn out the way Grandma's did. I was fortunate enough to watch her make them one time, and I can tell you the measuring cup was a tea/coffee cup from her regular dishes. The measuring spoons were the silverware and were "heaping" when she dumped in the ingredient. When she put the butter sugar and eggs in the Stand mixer, the "mix for 5 minutes" lasted until she finished a couple of other chores and was more like 20+ minutes. So the difference is usually in the manner in which they cooked. They had to learn to cook without measuring, because that is the way it was done in their day.
That being said, I am the same way. I make some things by taste. Chicken and Noodles, and Deviled Eggs come to mind. I recently had a woman I worked with (who admittedly had a perfectionist mother who could not stand the messes or mistakes when she was in the kitchen, so Jo did not learn to cook) ask for my recipe for Deviled Eggs. I researched recipes and found one that was very close to what I do to make them. I then boiled 1/2 dozen eggs, and took all of the ingredients to work and we made deviled eggs. She appreciated it, and I can tell you she ate every one of them that afternoon.
On the flip side, I usually make a recipe to the directions once, then I start changing things for a better taste, more or less heat, etc.
Thanks for the Memories BearisGray...
Happy Day
Susan