Sometimes I install Office 97 for kicks and marvel at how much I can do with it, yet it asks so little of my system. <2Mb RAM for Word 97!

Same here. I have a physical copy of Word 97, although TBH I use the classic licence key 11111-111111111 to "activate" it because it's easier.

It runs fine under WINE, and you can install the 3 service packs for it too. As released, when you try to save a .RTF file it actually doesn't. Not that that matters, but it's nice to have all the known the bug fixes.

It runs inside the L2 cache on any modern-ish CPU. Even on a Core 2 Duo, it's fast.

It is hilarious and sad to recall that when it came out -- I was working for PC Pro magazine around then -- it was seen as big and bloated and sluggish compared to Office 95. The Mac version, Office 98, was a port of the Windows version, and Mac owners hated it.

Now, it's tiny and sleek.

Same, I used to use Office 2003 because it was so quick and the UI was exactly what you needed.

On later versions they had animated cursor positions which felt slow, the spellcheck squiglies were lethargic and menus convoluted.

That said, I've given up and mostly use Google Docs/Sheets now because of the features and cross platform support.