My father has a friend named Paul when I was a child. He told me Paul was the actual Paul Bunyan from the folklore story. I went around school telling everyone I knew the actual Paul Bunyan despite me obviously recognizing he wasn't a giant nor did he have a blue ox. I thought it just meant he could grow and didn't have his ox with him.
I suppose it didn't take years for me to figure out I was wrong and my dad was messing with me, but it definitely took some time.
Now that I'm a father, I have a framed photo of an artists drawing of BIG on my wall. I tell my daughter biggie was an uncle of hers who passed many years ago and she believes it. Things go full circle!