I used another more recent HTC device (Blue Angel), second-hand, for a couple of years as my main phone, from 2011 to 2013 IIRC. With WiFi and Bluetooth, decent web browsers available (Opera Mini and Mobile, plus some WebKit forks/wrappers), Google syncing through ActiveSync, for a long time upgrading to a newer phone and OS was not a priority. I only stopped using it for a Android phone two years ago (with the "appification" trend, a web browser is sadly no longer enough).
Coincidentally, the Blue Angel was an early Android target[0], and people have made it run versions up to 2.3 (at which point it's too slow to be usable by today's standards).
I doubt that Android owes much to WM, after all it was a closed-source OS and certainly there wasn't any motivation to do things the "Windows way". It's important to point out that platforms like WM and Symbian existed well before iOS/iPhone OS and Android even had their names decided, and failures apart, the idea of "smart phone" was not the result of solely Apple or Android Inc./Google. Unfortunately, even in many tech circles this is not the idea that prevails.
I also own a Symbian-powered Nokia phone (without touchscreen, forgot the model), and I have no doubt it is a "real" smartphone OS. I can confirm it allows for all that you described and certainly even more in the newer devices with touchscreen.