A Better Idea ...
Stored Program Concept: Coding instructions and storing them as data in memory.
The idea is often attributed to John von Neumann but likely originated with John Mauchly and Presper Eckert (there is much controversy!). This is discussed on page 123 of the textbook.
Alan Turing also had the idea in his theoretical Turing Machine.
Who Cares?
You!! To start a program all you do is click and the program is loaded into main memory (thanks to the operating system) from secondary memory (for example the hard drive or a thumb drive or a CD or DVD) and starts running!