I had the joys of 4kids dub anime on Toonami (cartoon network) back in maybe 2005? In the uk…(they did advertise it to a degree when they debuted it to try and make it the next DBZ to my memory but it just fizzled away).
I was ignorant back then to japanese origins to anime's until I was told sailor moon had a Japanese origin and did some googling.
So I then went to the land of subbed episodes on youtube (those were the days) and did that for a little while to carry on from alabasta and then looked at the manga origins and bought some tankobons of the beginning to see if Viz translated any differently to 4kids (BIG difference lol).
And since I heard on a forum about Nami finally having another full fight since her last one in Alabasta I had to see the translated scans on MSN groups. So I jumped in during the Nami Vs Kalifa fight in enies lobby arc (I did read from water 7 to catch up to that point to understand the arc...those chapters felt like forever as I read them all in maybe 3 sittings) and I saw the beautiful fanservice catfight and was then following week to week until thriller bark started and I went touch and go again... Until I read Robin was prepping to have a double fight with Chopper (Yes I love a good cat fight lol) and somehow became reading it every week religiously since that point then cos the group fight with Oz was very interesting and so many twists and turns caught me hooked well and truly good.