> I genuinely struggled to follow the concepts in this article

I read the HN comments before I read the OP, which made me worry that the post was going to be some hifalutin type wonkiness. But instead the post is basically completely milquetoast, ordinary and accessible. I'm no type theorist--I cannot tell you what a monad is--and I confess that I don't understand how anyone could be intimidated by this article.