I remember when I was a young kid in the early-mid 80's Sports Illustrated did a large feature piece on Seve which detailed his very modest upbringing, and how he learned to play golf by hitting stones on a beach in Spain. I was immensely affected by his life story and rise to greatness - very very inspiring.
The other huge impression Seve made on me was much later, in a Golf World article written during the recent Open played at Hoylake (2006), where Seve competed. I should dig it out, because it was one of the finest golf articles I've ever read. He was obviously at a very shaky point with his game and was admittedly nervous about bringing it in front of the world. However, the gist of it was that he was doing it for his son, who apparently is/was an aspiring golfer, and who was (I believe) caddying for Seve that week. The part I remember most was when the writer asked about Seve about teaching his son the game, his reply was simply that his son "learned by watching". My son was one year old at the time, and that comment just spoke volumes to me, more about life than golf.
It says something that my two biggest memories/impressions of the man didn't really even happen on the golf course.