Locked out of my 2 month old MacBook pro

Ah! There’s the rub. It’s a new MBP I bought in July and hadn’t the time to start up. I did that 3 weeks ago and apparently did have the opportunity to enter a password and the hint “kinder”

In the meantime a terrible lot has happened. I just got back to it a few days ago. It opens with what looks like a rock island, getting smaller as it moves toward the user. Big Sur, the place, has a few. But maybe this is Catalina island. Most likely because of the smog pink in the background.

Aaaany way I don’t remember the password. I’ve changed myApple password on my iPhone and iPad. I give up. Can you help me, moonj ? Tres

Less

That is exactly what I had to do. Started up while pressing command R. I had already wiped the disk using utilities, but couldn’t think how to get it online to reinstall Catalina, the system it had when all this storm happened.

This morning I attached an old Seagate external drive, ask me for a password and I remembered.

It is, as I write, loading up. Awfully slow, which gives me pause. We’ll see.

thank you for your kind help. I and all my similarly challenged friends bless you. Lynn

PS. There is no Apple logo, nor anything other than the box waiting for my password.... I don’t even remember downloading anything, nor even trying getting online w/ WiFi

No, but when I thought that, I knew it wa unlikely. I think the key here is I didn’t finish initializing the MBP