actually, I thought of a (maybe) helpful way to visualise this.

x^-n is equivalent to 1÷(x^n), so 10^-1 is one tenth, 10^-2 is one hundredth, so on. the number, x, appears in the equation n times.

you can view positive exponents as the inverse, (x^n)÷1. likewise, the number appears n times.

so what happens for x^0? well, zero is neither positive nor negative. and to maintain consistency, x must appear in the equation zero times. so what you're left with is 1÷1, regardless of what number you input as x.