TOD:
Our first cable company was called Garden State Cable, which didn't find its way to our particular neighborhood until 1978 or so. Cable was cheap then, and my parents let themselves splurge on getting both HBO and Prism (a local premium service that showed Philadelphia sports teams as well as movies.) When we first got cable, HBO ran only during the prime time hours.
Among my favorite channels: there was some kind of arts channel (not ARTS) that showed odd productions of plays (I remember Donald Pleasance in UBU ROI.) DR PennyO mentioned the early Comedy Channel, which I liked for its hodgepodge of BBC comedies and 50s sitcoms (it's where I first saw I MARRIED JOAN.) I also enjoyed Arts and Entertainment--even though it was a premium channel, it still came through clear enough to watch its programming. It later morphed into ARTS, which was still unique enough to enjoy. And I'm not ashamed to admit that I spent a lot of time watching MTV.
Our first cable box (that we had for about ten years!) was a unit that had a console with thirteen buttons, a fine tuner and a switch to traverse the three tiers of channels, that ran from 02 to 36. The console was connected to the box with a cord that everyone was always tripping over.