From "what's a terminal" to a working $10/mo API — my first build in public

A few days ago I'd never opened a terminal. Today I have qr-api live — a QR Code API that turns any text into a scannable PNG with one API call. $10/month, unlimited requests. Started this with zero coding experience — just wanted to prove to myself I could take an idea from nothing to a real, paying product. Two sessions later: live API, real Stripe payments, and a customer could sign up right now. The stack: Node.js + Express, deployed on Railway, GitHub for version control, Stripe for billing, Postgres for storing API keys. Honestly, most of the hard parts weren't the QR code logic — it was learning git, fixing a JSON syntax error that broke three deploys in a row, and figuring out environment variables. If you're earlier in this than me, it's genuinely doable starting from zero. Building in public to stay accountable and hopefully help the next person starting from nothing too. Would love feedback — especially on pricing/positioning, or anything that looks off from a technical standpoint.