No. I tried the classic when it came out, but dropped it because I had already played all of that before. Didnt matter anyway because the reason I played the game for so long was the friends I had on it at the time.
I've played almost uninterrupted for 16 years, and it's pretty much always been because I've been lucky enough to have my original group of friends stay with it the entire time. It certainly helps to always find something to be competitive/try hard at, and that changes occasionally over the years... if it's not raiding, it's arena, or in the past 4 years or so mythic+.