From nothing to Something

Basically to tell the story;

I have grown up in quite a sheltered life, very contained from the outside world. It was a horrible lifestyle to live in, and at the age of 12 I was pretty much forced into work. Not necessarily by the force of my parents, but by the force of wanting to one day leave it all behind and finally get out there. Well the other day I got an offer which I cannot refuse! I have been studying a 'Management in Hospitality' course at college for the past two years and my work got IV'd. I recently have been thinking about University options and I went to view the University of Oxford. They asked me of my aspirations and saw samples of my work, as well as viewing my CV for my work experiences. At 12 years I was washing up at a small café, and slowly worked my way up to head waiter. I was there until I was 15 years old. I got an offer from a customer there who owned a wedding venue and after seeing my skills, he offered me a job working there for higher pay. So I took the offer and it only took me a year or two to work my way up in that organisation to supervisor. I got a job at the John Lewis Partnership at the age of 17 and worked my way up to an assistant SM. So anyway, the University saw this and decided to offer me a place on the International Management course, explaining to me that I will be travelling to California, Australia, India and Canada throughout my 4 years on the course. I am literally so thrilled that all this hard work is finally paying off, and I have moved away from a shitty sheltered life to an independent, self sufficient lifestyle. I now have my own place which I am sharing with my best friend, and i'm only 18! Everything Is moving so fast, people say I should slow down, but I am so focused at what I want in life I am grabbing every opportunity I get.

So what I really want to know is; Has anyone here gone to University and travelled? If so how did you find it and how did you get there?
I had to share this somewhere as its very exciting! Hopefully I will be something special for the future world to see