I call myself a 'piano player' rather than a classical pianist or a jazz musician, though I've aspired to be both of the latter. Mostly self-taught, I clock in at about Level 7 on Tonebase's scale.
I have played professionally in piano bars & other kinds of venues most of my life, working around the demands and strictures of my day job as a tax professional. I play mostly pop tunes and standards. Such technique as I do have *lacks refinement*, perhaps because I spent many years simulating grand effects in noisy environments where people couldn't hear the details.
I discovered classical music in my later years of High School, and in college had an opportunity to sudy intermittently with a world-class pianist named Miklos Schwalb. I've worked on classical reptoire ever since, mostly on my own. Presently obsessed with Rachmaninoff Preludes & the Well Tempered Clavier.