Can you initiate a conversation? My experience with WhatsApp is that if I don't give it access to contacts, other people have to initiate conversation. I cannot

Can you initiate a conversation? My experience with WhatsApp is that if I don't give it access to contacts, other people have to initiate conversation. I cannot just tell it to start a chat with phone 123 456 7890 (this is on Android). I guess it's debatable whether that's categorized as "it works" :>