My neighbor has an older Mac book but forgot his password. Command R is not going to the screen to put an new password in. Command S works and brings me to bios. How can I change password there?

Trying to set a new password for a neighbor because he can’t remember his password after getting 5 months of kemo. Can anyone help. The command button with the R doesn’t get you tho the screen to put new password. It will go to bios if I hit command and S to bring to factory settings but he would like to get the photos off the MacBook model A1181?