Signing in to your account, this may take a few minutes (watch series 2)

I’m having a problem that seems to be a regular thing for many users, but none of the solutions are working. Trying to pair an Apple Watch series 2 (2nd hand as a gift to see if I like it) with my iPhone XS, updated today to iOS 16.02. Keep getting the signing in to your account page and then……..nothing. I’ve tried resetting both watch and phone, I’ve tried setting up manually, nothing works. Any ideas?