Easterhay said:

We would always wonder, though, what happened before episode four. What was The Clone Wars? What made Anakin turn? Who was Luke and Leia's mother? We would always wonder...

See, I am speaking from the generation of SW fans who were around 10-11 years old when Jedi came out, and NOBODY talked about the Prequels, they wanted the Sequel Trilogy.

If you stayed a fan of the Star Wars Trilogy, and thought Jedi was great, then you wanted more adventures of Luke, Leia, and Han. I remember reading an interview in 1983, that Lucas was going to take 2 years off, and then film the Sequel Trilogy to come out in 1988, 1991, and 1994, take 2 more years off and then the Prequel Trilogy would come out in 1999, 2002, and 2005. At that time I was in middle school thinking Star Wars films were coming out for the next 20 years, and that was the coolest feeling in the world!

Back in the 80's with no internet, you just waited every summer to see if another Star Wars movie came out, and I remember by 1988, I gave up and thought the Sequel Trilogy would never happen.