I remember being very young and whenever something about a caveman being on TV, my parents telling me cavemen weren't real. I remember not fully understanding what a caveman was. I mean, a cave sounds like reasonable shelter for ancient man. Why wouldn't people live in caves? Then they explained that a caveman wasn't a man like today, they were some supposed being on the step to man that was part of that evolution nonesense.
Somewhere along the way, I began to accept that they existed along with the theories that go along with that.