Repeating Puberty

I've always been a late bloomer. It took me until my early twenties to feel comfortable flirting with and dating women, and I can say I do okay now. It was around the same time I started realizing I was also into men, but it wasn't until almost half a decade later that I began to get past the denial and shame, and I'm just now reaching a point of acceptance and tentative excitement. I decided that this new chapter of my life would involve me being more or less out and proud (though I've still got to break it to my family).I'm also in my first year of college (I was off doing the Air Force to pay for it til now). I joined a men's choir at the school, and they had a party last weekend for all the rookies - my first college party. Needless to say it was pretty much a wash, being mostly underage freshmen and shitty beer interspersed with a handful of jnrs/snrs/grads around my age.Then I saw him: my first real gay crush without shame or confusion. The first chance I'd have to flirt with a guy. He's gorgeous, like, hold-hands-and-go-for-long-walks pretty, and I decided to go for it.Now I can be fairly suave, erudite and coy when I'm flirting with a woman; I know how the game is played. But I was so starstruck by this new opportunity that I threw caution to the wind completely! I made a few clumsy passes, and generally fumbled the opportunity into oblivion.Thinking I was maybe too forward, I apologized to him the next day only to find out that he didn't even realize I was hitting on him! Ok so...he's thick or I'm too subtle? Worse, he's taken. But I didn't make him uncomfortable or anything, so no major failures I suppose.I'm more or less just happy that I tried, but I'm wondering if this is going to be the norm. Do I have to relearn how to flirt and date now? If there are other folks out there who realized they were into the same sex at a later stage, what was it like for you?