And other as you portray it now, Q4OS was actually full-filling all my other requirements I asked for. And as well recommented by a member here in the thread.
i hope i didn't overstate or oversell my familiarity with q4os. when i first started with linux a few years ago, like you, i was in search of lightweight linux distributions to use on (for me) an older system with not much ram or a particularly powerful cpu. i tested q4os at the time, but eventually settled with something different.
that being said, i did create a q4os virtual machine the other day to take a look. i think i posted before that it used about 800 MB of ram after boot and seemed to have most of what you were looking for except virtualization.
since your trouble earlier, i decided to try the q40s windows installer in a windows 10 virtual machine that i already have. when that installation goes as planned, you shouldn't end up at a command line (machine language) like you did before. there should be some configuration screens that appear to help you get things set up.
part of that procedure was choosing a Desktop Profile. the "Full featured" option comes with LibreOffice and google Chrome as well as some media players like VLC and Clementine. it has a Software Centre (or Plasma Discover) that offers an application named Synaptic. on my other q4os-only virtual machine i was able to use Synaptic (which has a graphical user interface) to install a program called
gnome-boxes
. that program is also available (without installing Synaptic) in Plasma Discover listed as GNOME Boxes:
https://help.gnome.org/users/gnome-boxes/stable/
i have not used Boxes. i have just read it may be an easier introduction to virtualization from within linux.
the installed-in-windows version of q4os only needed 508 MB of ram after the first boot. that version also comes with the kde plasma desktop which seems to be (i haven't used it much) more full-featured (and possibly new user friendly) than some of the more lightweight window managers used by something like antiX.
all that being said, the in-windows q40s install does make changes to your Efi System Partition (esp). it may be a bit of a hybrid install, but taking care to have a backup plan just in case seems like it would be a solid course of action.