It really depends on what your definition of "real money" is. Enough to pay hosting fees and earn a little extra spending money? Enough to offer some substantial supplemental income? Enough to live on? And to live in NYC? Or to live in a small rural town in the US? Or to live in Bangladesh?
My first income generated after 2 years 1 month online. I think it will take more than 1 years for getting regular money through Internet.
It is not a game that have stage took less time. you have to put so many efforts for long time to get it.
To be true... Im 18 now, i started HTML when i was 5, growed up learning PHP. Today im pretty good at PHP scripting and could make whatever i like, still.. To bad.. No money after all.. My first and only payment ever was €70 by google for placing ads at my proxies... Still, not making any money, not having 1 single money making website.. But hey, after 13 years starting html / php / getting to know alot about websites, i will never give up! I'll just be relaxed, still working on websites every single day, till the day comes that i have some nice running websites!
That's the thing Allardje, I am similar to you. The question should be: how long did it take until you made real money online FROM THE MOMENT YOU TOOK IT SERIOUSLY? Because otherwise it's difficult to answer, from where do you start? I started creating websites like you before 2000 for fun as a hobby since my hobby was already computing I think from the moment I took it seriously it was about one to two years before I made real money online, but what is real money, for everyone it is different For sure it took me way longer than if I was to start it all again from fresh with the things I know now and didn't have a clue about back when I started to take it seriously.
Since I was 10, I was in love with adsense, first revenue of that comed after 6 years, and then I started freelancing.