Hi DEV Community — I'm an accountant who fell into crypto. Help?

Olena Kovalenko — Tue, 19 May 2026 14:54:59 +0000

I'm Olena, an accountant from Kyiv. By day, I help people with taxes and spreadsheets. By night, I try to understand why my crypto wallet keeps showing weird transaction hashes.

How I got here:
Two years ago, a friend sent me some USDC. I thought it was magic internet money. Then I learned about gas fees, seed phrases, and what "not your keys, not your coins" actually means. Now I'm hooked — and slightly terrified.

What I know:

How to balance a ledger (useful!)
Basic crypto safety (2FA, cold storage, not clicking random links — mostly)
That I don't know nearly enough

What I'm learning:

Python (very beginner — pandas and requests so far)
How smart contracts actually work under the hood
Why good security is harder than good code

What I'm building:
A small community tool for crypto degens. Nothing launched yet. Mostly failing and learning.

Why I'm here:
DEV seems like a place where people explain things without making you feel stupid. I need that energy.

My question to you:
If you had to recommend ONE resource (course, book, video, whatever) for a non-developer who wants to understand blockchain basics — what would it be?

Thanks for reading. I'll try to ask smart questions and share what I learn along the way.

— Olena (she/her) | Kyiv, Ukraine

DEV Community: Olena Kovalenko

Hi DEV Community — I'm an accountant who fell into crypto. Help?