RE: Some of my favorite songs... fasten your seat belt.
Yeah I started playing in either 1987 or 1988. I even went for a dual music/physics major when I went to college first. They wouldn't let me use classical guitar as my instrument of choice so I took Cello for awhile. Though I never got to be really good at the Cello as when I went home I was always playing guitar. :)
I didn't mention BLUES because while I know technically how to play it, the chords, the scales, modes, etc. when I play it it sounds more like Rock. EVERY style of music has a unique feel that if you can't find that feel then it doesn't matter how technically skilled you are at it. Blues is in that vein for me. I can hit all the notes, but I don't sound like blues. It also has nothing to do with whether I have the blues/emotionally or not. :)
I played good blues once and it was accidental and I wasn't depressed or anything, though unfortunately I don't remember how I got to that point.
This is pretty common though. I've never really seen a guitarist that I think is good at ALL styles. I've seen people that are good at most of them, but there always seem to be some that they can hit the notes but something FEELING wise is missing. I sometimes call it finding the groove.
I am good at flamenco, classical, rock, and metal grooves. I could throw punk in there, but I don't usually bother because I could do that stuff within a week of picking up the guitar so for me it doesn't count. :)
Oh and yes I played in the college Jazz band for awhile. I was relegated to just chords and back ground rhythm mostly so I was pretty bored. The prof in charge of that band was way into brass and he didn't really let the guitar shine that much. I learned and used a lot of weird chords... that's about it. :)