i wont buy another one because i locked myself out of my icloud and despite my ipad working fine i reset it to give to my daughter. except now it wont work with

i wont buy another one because i locked myself out of my icloud and despite my ipad working fine i reset it to give to my daughter. except now it wont work without the icloud account. i went to the apple store with the device itself, and as much proof as i could muster that the original icloud email i used no longer exists.. and they kindly offered to recycle my old one (old meaning less than a year, its 128gb) and sell me a new one. never again.