Uploading photos from iPhone to Photos (MacMini 2021)

I recently replaced my 2010 MacMini with the latest MacMini. It was mandated when my iPhone SE was no longer recognized by the old MacMini's operating system, and to use my phone for a camera and not have to pay more for iCloud storage, by simply downloading my photos from the phone to the computer thru direct (wired) connection to the computer (no iCloud for me, thanks). The old MacMini could not support any OS higher than 10.11.6, so the new computer was (in my opinion) necessary in order to see my phone's photos for the manual transfer of photos to the computer. (The new Mini runs OS 11.4 Big Sur...and I'm planning on upgrading to OS12 very soon.)

Now when I upload photos from the phone, I see many duplicates of mov files....almost seems like the OS is breaking the movie into the individual frames of said "Mov" file. I started deleting the duplicate 'files' (if they are "files") from Photos manually as part of the process to get only 'clean' photos and make navigating thru the listed photos easier for me.

Then, I wondered if this is a problem and if Apple can (or is) trying to resolve this as a reported issue. That prompted me to come here; what I read has put the fear of "God" into me. Have I screwed up by deleting those Photos "duplicates" and leaving only ONE of what I presume to be a working, original video (with the ".MOV" identifier)? Some experts here have said DO NOT DELETE THESE irritating Aliases from the Library. How bad have I potentially screwed the pooch here? (I am deleting the whatever-they-are from the window/dialog that opens when I connect the phone and want to transfer photos from phone to computer, and that is the list of all the photos in the "Library" that shows up when I select my iPhone. In some instances there are more than 5 "duplicate" photos or videos listed in that window--I've seen and deleted up to 7 of those "duplicates" for many individual photos already.