I'm the same, (well, mid thirties, and over a decade) but I always click accept for cookies.

The only times I've stopped, or tried to deny it is with the recent thing I've seen from some sites that say "accept cookies or pay money". I think that is scummy, and against what these regulations require, so I'll usually just close the site in that case.

Oh and to address the point from the main article, I think I'm unfortunately beholden to more companies, but would strongly prefer to not verify my identity, because I have little to no trust in the companies to safeguard my actual personal data. (rather than inferred cookie tracking data, which they can have imo).