Erase and Reinstall Monterey, now doesn't see the keyboards

I am repurposing a Mac, so I erased it using Disk Utility. It defaulted to AFPS format. So I erased it. I reinstalled Monterey, now it doesn't see my keyboard. Same keyboard I have always used. Tried another keyboard. Tried all of the USB ports (they are working as they see my external drive). I can't do another erase as it doesn't recognize Command - R. I am stuck in a corner on this. Is there a way to put a flash drive with Monterey on it and boot off of that? Then try to somehow erase it using Mac journaled?