As for me, I discovered FMP completly by accident, when my husband brought me the Newtype USA from Anime Expo (I think it was from Anime expo? Anyway in July), so I read the first episode, and got completly "COOOOOOOOLlLLLL, Wanna read more!!! More!!!!", but when I tried to order it, the people in the shop couldn't find it, and kept saying it didn't...existed.... @_@; *lol*
Then I gave up, and decided to wait a bit, then went to a book fair in Germany, where nice people from Kadokawa gave me all the volumes of the manga released then (1 - 4) ^________^ [[nota : it's due to the profession I do that I get free manga like that, they ain't giving it that easily otherwise... ^^ *lol* ]]
I got then obsessed by the series instantly (was already sort of),and bought Ikinari Full metal panic, the whole anime series that I watched right away (some in DVD, the rest in huge bad quality VCDs... T_T Waiting to get the rest in DVD too).
Now I'm gonna order the books, and I'm already waiting for them to deliver my guide book & encyclopedia.
^-^ that's it...