I found this great shot at a Muscatine High School Class of ’88 reunion site. That’s a Dragonlance module on the right. We played one of those at camp in junior high. My mother dragged me to see Cats a year or two later, and I remember bringing Dragons of Spring Dawning with me. I was much distressed when the lights in the auditorium went down and I was no longer able to read my book. My distress sharpened when people dressed up like cats danced onto the stage and started to sing.
2 Warps to Neptune 
Hoo boy. Feel like 5th Grade all over again. I had quite a few friends into D&D; they tried to get me into it but I just couldn’t immerse myself deeply enough to enjoy playing.
Nonetheless, the Fiend Folio did become one of my favorite picture books (the Eye of the Beholder was my absolute favorite creatures), I totally dug the small, pewter figures (which a few of my friends took the time to meticulously paint) and that crazy 20-sided die (icosahedron)!
Yeah, D&D took a lot of time, and it was a pain in the ass to get everybody on the same page. Sometimes we would spend hours rolling characters and never get around to an actual campaign.
The pewter figures were awesome, but they were too expensive for me. I had a couple of the books, and I “borrowed” the others from friends when I wanted to draw dungeons at home.
LoL. I remember the whole ordeal in “creating a character.” I guess the best thing to be at the time was a “Paladin,” so naturally I strived to be one. But then with the whole random roll of the dice for hit points, etc. I totally ended up with a weak character, so that was strike 1 for me.
I had one friend who was a supreme dungeonmaster; he spent more time drawing/planning dungeons on graph paper in class than doing schoolwork itself, lol. But boy was he the toast of the d&d nerds when he presented them with his masterpieces.
Surely though, as you say…definitely took a lot of time and patience, which I didn’t have much of during 5th grade recesses. hehe =)