I guess I count as a trained "professional" (although I won't add the phrase "stunt programmer" -- "stunt herald", yes, but that's a tangent).

I have most of a Computer Science degree that I am working on finishing, and I have 25 years of experience in the field. I do find myself using stuff I learned at university, but life has been a continuing education, including PerlMonks. Most of the languages I can count as "known/used" were self-taught, but the underlying concepts were there to be built on.