My first day of composing was back in 7th grade, and man were things a lot simpler. Repetition, repetition, repetition. Every so often I'd change from a minor chord to a major chord, but other than that it was nothing special. Off-chord notes sounded strange and I could barely grasp the idea of a minor 7th chord. Moving into high school and college, my ear grew sharper and honed in on the idea of chord progression and key changes. Listening to composer like Liszt and Rachmani