Great story and great prompt, @Peadar. I enjoyed maps in their paper and tactile form since I was a kid, driving across the USA with my parents. I was an early road editor on Waze when that first came along. But, much like @tony_b, the suggestions from Google to add my travel photos to Maps really kicked things off. For a while, it was treated as a travel diary of sorts.
Now, my overall purpose has changed. I really enjoy the anonymous nature of being a steward of useful and correct information to help businesses and folks who use Maps. Like many on your list, I use the system that @AdamGT created for us to look at my impact across photo submissions and to track the volume of edits and roads I do each month. Back in 2022, I wrote about how the Leaderboard Top 100 System even reignited my spark for being active on the Maps and Connect (HERE).
By the way, you posted a wonderful photo. I had to look that up to see if it was a colorful moth or a fuzzy butterfly. Now, I’d like to meet a fuzzy butterfly!