App Store Stuck in "You Have 5 Apps To Adopt" ... "Could not assign applications to your account"

Help! I'm stuck in a loop with the App Store saying "You Have 5 Apps To Adopt" then after entering my AppleID "Could not assign applications to your account".

This is a new MBP13 M1 I got in early December. Running Big Sur 11.2 (had same issue with 11.1)

I had previously had GarageBand/iMovie/Pages/Numbers/Keynote on my prior MBP (i7 Late 2011). After moving across my user and apps to this new laptop I noticed the App Store Account page saying the "You Have 5 Apps ...".

I've tried:

• deleting and reinstalling the 5 Apps (many times with reboots at all possible times between steps)
• creating another admin user on the laptop and using that to adopt the apps
• clearing /Library/Caches/com.apple.appstore and com.apple.appstoreagent
• clearing /Library/Application Support/App Store/adoption.plist

It did seem to adopt them at one point and for a couple of days wasn't saying "You Have ..." but it came back <sad face>.

Anyone any other ideas? I've googled and exhausted anything else but concluding it maybe time to contact Apple support.

TIA,

Jon.