Another dumb newbie question

Years ago when I was a wine buyer for a steak & seafood restaurant here in Reno, NV, I had a salesman pour me a taste of wine from a bottle he had just opened in front of me. I mentioned that I really didn't care for the wine (I was looking for a low-cost blend to use as a house wine). He produced another glbutt, put his thumb over the neck of the bottle and shook it vigorously. I laughed as he poured me another taste and d****** if that hadn't opened the wine up. I hadn't eaten anything and had only the one taste.

I also remember having a 1999 M. Chapoutier La Bernadine that morphed about five times before it became this illustrious blackberry-chocolate-smoke in a glbutt. Nothing eaten before or after unless you include the chewy texture of the wine.

I can still remember the 1996 Bruno Brolia Gavi di Gavi that used to begin lemony and tart and would slowly soften on the sides while hints of anise coated the back of my palate. It still makes my mouth water :)

One of the joys of drinking wine IS following a wine through its stages. I am guessing there is an actual scientific-chemical explanation for this process as the wine releases molecules formerly in stasis (I'm no scientist, but drinking wine makes me so). It would be naive to think that a wine does not "open up" as we can follow the wine to its final stages where it falls completely apart.