They were much more expensive in those days IIRC - today they are the cost of a couple of coffees, those days they were more like 25% the cost of a new computer... per year! It was also quite inaccessible in terms of purchasing - contracts, call our sales team etc. Things like GoDaddy were still either non-existent or very nascent in the mid-late 90s when I was just starting out as a early teen online.
I had dreams as a youngster of owning my own domain name (just one!) and running my own site there... Now I don't even know how many domains I own!
-- in the early 90s you could easily get domains for free - there were many registrars who would give you free .com or .co.uk in return an iframe that advertised the registrar! - this all but disappeared after 1995 =( --
I remember getting a free .co.uk domain name around the year 2000. Can't remember the business model but it was probably similar to the underpant gnomes.
In the mid to late 90s, domains cost $50 per year, and you had to buy the first two years up front, so a domain cost $100. Nowhere near 25% of the cost of a new computer which were much more expensive back then.
In the UK I recall being quoted about £200 a year for a domain (this may have been direct from nominet or non-consumer company for a UK one - as I mentioned the services in the mid-late 90s were less developed and it was harder to just buy online, especially without a credit card which you cannot have in the UK when under 18). Our pentium PC was £899 IIRC.
I had dreams as a youngster of owning my own domain name (just one!) and running my own site there... Now I don't even know how many domains I own!