I see a lot of people in here posting success stories from lessons, which is great. But I tried lessons for about 2 months and go absolutely nowhere haha. It was just repeatedly practicing some song that I wasn't super into and I never even felt like I was "singing" just talking kind of louder / longer and felt very forced and odd. Terrible experience tbh, but I do love singing and still want to some day. (I generally just sing in falsetto to songs in my car because I'm too timid to really project my actual voice)

It sounds like you didn't have a very good coach. My first coach wasn't very helpful, my second was amazing. Keep looking!

Open mic nights at your local bar are a great source of data. Approach people after their performance, compliment them, and ask them if they have a coach they'd be willing recommend.

Try recording yourself as you do karaoke. The external perspective and hearing it "in the mix" really helps you tune your performance.