Welcome to Steemit, and really nice intro!
As social venues go, Steemit really isn't like anything else out there. It most resembled what we used to call "social blogging" which was extremely popular before MySpace and Farcebook came along and turned everything into ever shorter and more inane soundbytes.
People would share actual content from their lives-- article style-- and the discussion would go. And that's sort of what people like to do here. Although, of course, there are folks of many different persuasions here.
Anyway, hope you enjoy your time with us. The water is a LOT deeper than twitter and instagram.
Thank you for the warm welcome! Yes, I've been very excited to return back to such a community-driven format for personal anecdotes. It's so refreshing to be somewhere where people are genuinely interested in conversation.