mongo-express running in minikube doesnt seem to be using password from secret

Question

Basically ive set up a mongo-express pod to run but when i connect to it, the password i set simply doesn't work.

Q1) Can i check if its using the secret, eg "kubectl get secrets" or open up docker container for mongodb and go to some specific config file to see password it expects me to use??

Q2) why isn't this working?

The image below is an example of where im upto.

example

some of the scripts below have been cut down to the relevant parts. full files at my github https://github.com/learncss666/no_password_secret

1. my secret yaml

apiVersion: v1
kind: Secret
metadata:
  name: mongodb-secret
type: Opaque
data:
  mongo-root-username: dGdtamFjaw==
  mongo-root-password: cGFzc3dvcmQ=

2. the part of my mongo.yaml that handles the secret

....
          env:
            - name: MONGO_INITDB_ROOT_USERNAME
              valueFrom:
                secretKeyRef:
                  name: mongodb-secret
                  key: mongo-root-username

            - name: MONGO_INITDB_ROOT_PASSWORD
              valueFrom:
                secretKeyRef:
                  name: mongodb-secret
                  key: mongo-root-password
....

3. get all, to show my pods and stuff

PS C:\Users\tgmjack\Desktop\k8s prac> kubectl get all


NAME                                     READY   STATUS    RESTARTS      AGE
pod/mongo-express-859f75dd4f-xtthk       1/1     Running   1 (48m ago)   16h
pod/mongodb-deployment-699744c7d-xtp7r   1/1     Running   1 (48m ago)   19h

NAME                            TYPE           CLUSTER-IP      EXTERNAL-IP   PORT(S)          AGE
service/kubernetes              ClusterIP      10.96.0.1       <none>        443/TCP          42h
service/mongo-express-service   LoadBalancer   10.96.233.157   <pending>     8081:30000/TCP   16h
service/mongodb-service         ClusterIP      10.104.65.149   <none>        27017/TCP        18h

NAME                                 READY   UP-TO-DATE   AVAILABLE   AGE
deployment.apps/mongo-express        1/1     1            1           16h
deployment.apps/mongodb-deployment   1/1     1            1           19h

NAME                                            DESIRED   CURRENT   READY   AGE
replicaset.apps/mongo-express-859f75dd4f        1         1         1       16h
replicaset.apps/mongodb-deployment-6658f4c549   0         0         0       19h
replicaset.apps/mongodb-deployment-699744c7d    1         1         1       19h

4. but then i got go to mongo-express, it asks for a username and password and mine doesnt work

######################

I'm at 1:45 in this tutorial, Ive followed every step

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X48VuDVv0do&t=1099s

######## update I found how to get the username n password from secret... this is base 64 for "tgmjack" and "password"

PS C:\Users\tgmjack\Desktop\k8s prac> kubectl get secret mongodb-secret -o=jsonpath='{.data.mongo-root-password}'
cGFzc3dvcmQ=
PS C:\Users\tgmjack\Desktop\k8s prac> kubectl get secret mongodb-secret -o=jsonpath='{.data.mongo-root-username}'
dGdtamFjaw==