My parents buying a house adjacent to a railway line just months before I was born, so that the railway was always a very real presence just across the road, must be a major contributing factor for me. In fact, despite the eventual moving out of home to a completely different area of the UK, and a couple more movements since then, theres only been ten months of my entire life so far where I havent lived within 50 yards of a railway.
My Gran taking me up to Newcastle station from the age of about 3 upwards to look at the big Intercity trains (and give my parents a break for a few hours!) for an hour or two in amongst doing other things no doubt helped as well.
Im interested in various aspects of the railway; principally liveries, train formations and scheduling; In the past I used to take down numbers fairly rigorously principally to fulfil these interests rather than any aim to see every loco or anything like that; these days Ill just jot down what Ive seen as I pass through places. I just generally enjoy travelling on trains, I find that tying in a bit of train travel with a days walking in the British countryside is usually very therapeutic, and I love preserved steam railways for this reason. Plus preserved steam railways usually seem to have a selection of good ales available within their vicinity one way or another

Im a keen photographer as well, and trains are my favourite photo subjects: Shooting pics of steam locos in the countryside, or perhaps modern stock in the city just seems right somehow!