does the enjoyment I feel at complimenting people and seeing their faces light up emanate from a healthy place of caring for others, or is it subconsciously a desire to get them to like me?
I don’t think the desire to get others to like you could trigger
pleasure at the knowledge that you’ve cause someone else pleasure.
More questionable is whether you’d compliment others even if you didn’t feel such pleasure as you describe at the realization that
they enjoyed your words, but merely the satisfaction of a mitzvah accomplished. Either way, keep complimenting! People need it, not enough people do it (?), and in any case, “l’olam ya’asok adam b’Torah ub’mitzvos shelo lishmah!”