I kept trying lightweight DEs like this over and over again (XFCE, LXDE, MATE, etc.) - I wanted them to work because I'd rather not give the desktop any more CPU resources than necessary. Time and time again there were a handful of things that I realized I'd taken for granted with the more heavy desktops (Gnome, KDE, etc.) that brought me back.

In the end I realized what I wanted was something that got out of my way and let me drive with a keyboard (and yes, was full of all the features I'd expect without needing to tweak and script). I've landed with PopOS using their tiling WM system, and I haven't looked back.