How does it start?

I spend a lot of time thinking about how people become authors. To my mind they are born on rainy evenings, in a darkened room with a bottle of wine and an ashtray full of cigarettes. So when last week when I couldn't sleep and got up in the dark, I poured myself a glass, rolled a cigarette went to the windowsill watching the rain and it kinda dawned on me that this was how I always imagined it. As it so happened I was already past five and something pages. 

But how does it really start? Do you decide that you want to be a writer like, I dunno, the way you decide to become a vet or an astronaut? Or does something happen to you that makes you want to share it with others? 

I know I was not even six years old when I knew I wanted to write, only I never got passed the part where you decide on what. I do have a pretty awesome story in my head, ready from start to finish but I never get down to writing it. So I keep on wondering. 

The weather fascinates me. Every time I smell a wiff of rain, the cold before the snow or see a nice angle of lighting I get ideas. However, I always get the feeling that that's what everyone would write about and it leaves a bad taste in my mouth like an icky peanut in a bowl that makes you want to eat another one quickly. I guess I could always shower a blog full of my sad little sketches...