I think I first encountered #IRC in the late #1990s and again about five years later in the early #2000s. I did not like it either time. In the early #2010s, I encountered #SILC and learned to tolerate IRC through its descendant SILC. Like it? No, but now I can tolerate it (and that is my main use for #Matrix — a mostly always connected IRC client).

So @moonman is not alone there.