Been In Default for Over 20 Years

I attended college for one year. At the time, my dad had just died, my family lost our home due to his unemployment a few months earlier, my mother was very dependent and had never had a job, and almost every weekend she would visit my dorm room unannounced to cry on my shoulders about being 36 and having to move back in with her parents. I quit school, got a minimum wage job, got an apartment, and helped her financially. I then lost my job and worked part-time minimum wage jobs for several years. I was living in the Appalachian region of Ohio where jobs, even part-time jobs, have been hard to find for years.

When she found a boyfriend I didn't get along with, I moved to another area, met my (now ex) husband and had two kids. He wouldn't keep a job, nor help me with the kids while I worked, so, again, I struggled financially. We ended up filing bankruptcy in 1994. After our divorce, he didn't pay child support for several years.

My children are both now adults and I've had the same job for 12 years. I still don't make much money ... $10.85 an hour. I asked a bankruptcy attorney several years ago about making repayment agreements for my student loan and he told me sometimes it's best just to leave sleeping dogs lie. It isn't even on my credit report, so I have no idea how to even go about making a repayment agreement.

I guess my question is is it possible to obtain financial aid again after 20 years of default? Again, both my children are grown, I would like to do better in life than what I am doing, I feel that I haven't reached my full capacity, and I would like to return to college. It's difficult to live on a net pay of $323 a week (full time even!) while stagnating in a job that offers absolutely no challenges or chance of advancement. I pay all my bills out of this (rent, utilities, groceries, etc.) and am actually still supporting my 19 yr old son while he goes to college on $323 a week!

Would making the 12 payments, as I've read about, put me back in good financial standing after that many years so that I would be eligible to receive financial aid again? Or would the total due, which I don't even know what that might be, have to be paid? Would I even be eligible again for financial aid at this point in time?