I've always loved dogs....don't really remember it "starting" though. When I was young, most of my relatives had dogs. We would visit and I would spend the whole time playing with the dogs and not talking to the family!
And when they visited us, the would always bring the dogs for me to play with. When I was 5, my parents got me a cocker spaniel named Dandy for my birthday. We had him for a week and in that time, he dragged me down a hill on my knees (Yes, I was too stupid and scared to just let go! ) and bit everyone in the family except me. When he bit my 2 year old sister, my mom had enough and brought him back to the breeder we got him from. We didn't get another dog until I was 10.
I used to go to the neighbor's houses and ask to walk their dogs. I'm sure they loved that, I would walk around the neighborhood for hours with the poor things! Most of them were big dogs but one of them was a dachsund that I almost walked the legs right off!!