Motivation to start learning an instrument?

There's this video on youtube (not sure what the rules are about linking) of Elliott Smith playing Southern Belle live in Olympia, Washington. The show was professionally shot to be released I think as a DVD but the project was scrapped. Anyway, he plays this song pretty early in his set. He's a pretty quiet, low key individual, not really a fan of being in the spotlight. You get the idea. And he's getting ready to play this song. He messed up on his first song and so he's feeling a little embarrassed, it's pretty clear. He's kinda looking out at the audience, this sheepish smile plastered on his face, and he kinda mumbles quietly about how he's nervous because he hasn't been playing very much lately. And then he starts playing. And this song is so good, so fast and complex, his fingers flying all up and down the fret. And except for the pained expression that comes over him while he's singing (it's a song about his mom and stepdad, not his favorite topic), he just keeps smiling at the audience in that sheepish way, as if everything he's doing with his fingers on the guitar is a easy for him as breathing. I knew I'd never be able to even remotely do anything like what I was watching him do, but it made me want to try. And I'm still trying, 12 years later.