You are absolutely right and it makes sense to start with a spreadsheet. As I said elsewhere, you have to reach a pain threshold in order to look for alternatives to Excel. And how soon you reach the pain threshold depends on how big your data is and how many users are trying to modify the same data at the same time.
Doesn’t really change the point.
As of this writing, there are twenty-two comments on this thread about airtable. All but four are either you or responding to you bringing it up.
I think it’s fair to say that whatever its advantages may be, it is relatively unknown, and therefore a higher-overhead entree into programming than straight up spreadsheets.
Just learning about it or finding fit for purpose takes more time than diving into a spreadsheet. And as always the argument is not that spreadsheets are more powerful or better, but that they are much easier and more incremental to learn and start with.