Mongo I have read those articles also, they do indicate that the older you are when you quit usually the less you will regain if you have really fried your brain and the longer it will take to regain what you have lost if you only browned your brain instead of really frying it.
The neat thing is that when they are indicating "older" they are talking (If I recall correctly) 60+ years old, I was 52 when I quit and have been amazed at what I have regained in just the short 2 1/2 months I have been sober.
On another really positive note for me, when they did blodd work on me when I went into de-tox my liver enzyme levels indicated I had a "Fatty Liver" which is a pre-cursor to cirrosis of the liver and alcoholic hepatitis liver. The doctor told me that as long as I didn't drink any more my liver would fully recover. Well I had liver blood work done last Friday and they called me a few days ago to let me know my liver enzymes were back to normal!