I would have been 6 at the time. I (very vaguely) remember learning about it at school, probably 2-3 years later. A while back (oh god it was 20+ years ago now) I visited friends in the Portland area (hi @Thumper ) and was very surprised when a mountain on the horizon turned out in fact to be the fabled Mount St Helens which I'd known about my whole life but never knew exactly where it was or realised I'd ever actually see it with my own eyes! But to the folks I was visiting it was just a normal thing in the background, and we didn't go to visit it more closely or anything.