Sorry for the late reply... real life kicking my ass and I wanted to make it a good one.
My original intention was to write something to make normal people get interested in watching anime, but I saw other similar posts and decided to focus more on the point of the community, how we're so active and chatty and helpful and so on...
You're right that the average person wouldn't understand the real great stuff hidden in some of these genres ,did you watch Made in Abyss?, really deep and controversial that went under the radar for quite some episodes. I've found out that some mangas and novels are incredible, just plain incredible to the point that the anime shivers in comparison; yet I also think that it's because of the anime that some novels or manga shine... can't quite explain myself correctly there. The mangas and the novels I've read effectively contain many great scenes that can't fit in the time interval of the anime, mostly due to speed. I mean, I can read several tomes in one day, but there is no way I can watch several hundreds of episodes in one day, such a shame really.
You're 100% right, I totally and completely forgot to mention how much of a reach we've gotten. I guess I'm still used to think anime is a small thing worldwide when it's actually completely opposite, with more and more entertainment venues getting influenced by ourselves. Glad to have you around :D