Not sure how old you are, but 'round 2000 not only was Microsoft ascendant but everybody hated them for it. We're talking Clippie-era Microsoft, when pretty much every problem your computer had was related to ActiveX, Word and Excel macros would suddenly stop working because Microsoft and there was fuckall else you could run. Linux? Don't make me laugh. Apple? ...yeah, you're going to use that for business. At the time it still ran OS9, the least-loved mongrel operating system to ever grace a RISC processor. Microsoft was the Ma Bell of 2000 - a big, heinous behemoth that made money not through innovation but through stifling competition. Was the lawsuit necessary? Hard to say. Was it inevitable? Absolutely.
My first introduction to Linux was a whole issue off Boot Magazine dedicated to it, including two CDs and instructions on how to use it. I ran out of things to play with and said "cool toy but Meh." That was in I think 98?
I started with FreeBSD, having seen it mentioned on the ftp.cdrom.com MOTD while looking for Doom mods. I don't remember when that was, but looking for Doom mods was a thing people were doing so, you know, the stone age. I switched to linux relatively late, Best Buy was selling shrinkwrapped Red Hat and Suse boxes by then.