At what point when learning an instrument were you comfortable from going from saying that you're a beginner to "I play (instrument)"?

My father was a music teacher and I have a learning disability. I could never tell Dad that I never caught on to the fingering to be even a beginner!

When you feel comfortable playing in public. Upright bass, bass guitar, guitar, ukulele and drums. Started playing publicly in high school, got paid 6 to 8 times minimum wage. Four years ago playing ukulele with another guy got second place for small instrumental group for our state.

I used to play guitar.

After about a year of practicing, I finally developed the wrist strength to play bar chords with minimal effort.
So I’d say that it took me about a year.

I want to say it took me a few minutes to be ‘fluent’, maybe a quarter of an hour to have a professional level (needed to participate in a philharmonic orchestra).
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Triangel.

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I don’t have rhythm though…

https://youtu.be/FMqDnWebXag

Several years. I went from being a guitar student to player when I started playing in gigging bands. 25 years later I’m not much better now than I was then so it’s uncommon that I even mention that I play.

I went from “I’m a beginner” to “I play, but not well” to “I play”. And the change happened as my comfort with the instrument increased and my opinion of my own play went up. But the entire thing has now degraded to “I used to play”. I USED to play piano and I USED to play cello.

When you can take the sheet music and play pieces with minimum effort and minimum practice

I play piano, organ, guitar