My first real books were because of Disney and Classics Illustrated. Somehow I picked up a Classics Illustrated because of the cover in my quest grabbing the Donald Duck, Archie and Veronica, Sad Sack, Two-Gun Kid, GI Combat etc comics and loved it. I remember my favs were Three Musketeers, Lion of the North, Men of Iron and The White Company (Dumas, Henty, Pyle and Doyle)
Then I was over my grandmother's house and she had a bookshelf that had some books on it and I found those titles there and the connection was made between the "Classics" part of Classics Illustrated and the real books I was holding in my hands. (of course she gave them to me since they'd belonged to a long dead relative) And I was off and running
Now most of the classics I read then are available here at Mobileread and at Archive.org and Project Gutenberg (first). (highly recommend G.A. Henty who wrote so many books that got into C.I. - Lion of the North is still a fond favorite)
So then my parents saw me reading "books" not comics and I was off into some books I'll probably never see in legal ebook format
The lost favorites hehe.. The Chip Hilton sports series by Claire Bee, Tom Swift Jr by Victor Applebee (there was even a series of early 1900's Tom Swift books about Jr's father), Rick Brant series by John Blaine, The Black Stallion series by Walter Farley, My Friend Flicka, Bronc Burnett, Tom Quest, Hardy Boys...