On Sonoma and also on Sequoia- when trying to Safe Boot or Recover on a mac m1 and/or m2 mini - I spent several hours and with several keyboards- old, new, bluetooth being unable to log in by using the password after picking option or volume. Thus going back with trackball to restart. Finally found out that regardless of keyboard setting re slow keys- when trying to start in recovery/safeboot the keyboard setting ’ slowkeys’ flashes on and then dissappears. So to type your admin password or family name password one must hold each key down for at least 2 seconds when entering and watching carefully when the ’ dot’ appears for the key you press.
After going back to normal - the regular speed keyboard works as usual