Most interesting & sympathetic, those ruminations, as is your whole project!
As a musician, I’ve always enjoyed Leadbelly’s definition, when asked by some earnest type if he played folk music: “well, it must be folks music: I ain’t never heard no mule sing it!”
I grew up with traditional music; both directly from my parents, and via recordings; and no radio or TV worth mentioning until I was 8 or so (1970), when we moved from the West Highlands to rural Lincolnshire.
I was always aware of traditional music; both by oral tradition and by recordings, largely of music my parents knew by oral tradition.
Some of my earliest non-parental musical memories were of learning by oral tradition from the kids I walked home from my one-room school with: one day it could be Yellow Submarine (long before I ever heard a Beatles recording) another it could be “dirty” WWII army songs, another could be “We’re all off to Dublin in the green, in the green, to join the IRA.”
I dived into rock’n'roll, punk, & reggae (both as a fan and then as a musician) as I became exposed to it later, but could always bond with my parents over the inspired ancient/modern fusions of the Steeleyes & Fairports.
These days, 3000 miles away in Montreal, I play mainly folk music (Celtic, Canadian & American, East European: see website) but it seems quite natural to me to sing the odd Clash or Ian Dury song at a trad session.

Here’s a health to you lot & your worthy endeavour, and give my best to the Auld Sod: who knows when I’ll ever get to walk it again myself.
Cheers, Patrick