It sounds like the installation script is partially failing—likely at the point where it tries to insert the admin account into the database. Since the tables are created but the admin user isn’t, this could be due to:
PHP errors during execution (e.g., due to missing extensions or permissions).
Timeouts or max execution limits in PHP or Apache.
Incorrect SQL user permissions even if GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES was applied.
A few things to check:
PHP error logs (/var/log/apache2/error.log or check with journalctl -xe) to see if any script error occurs.
Make sure PHP has mysqli or PDO_MySQL enabled (check with php -m).
Try increasing max_execution_time and memory_limit in your php.ini.
If the script uses transactions, make sure InnoDB is enabled in MariaDB.
Double-check that your SQL user has INSERT privileges in addition to ALL (sometimes ALL doesn't behave as expected across different contexts).
Lastly, you could try re-running the installer after wiping the DB to see if it's a one-time issue or consistent. Hope that helps! Let us know what you find in the logs.
Let me know if you want a version that’s more technical or more beginner-friendly.