Relations problem due to internal Social dilemmas

This is going to be a long post but I believe I have an odd issue here. There is many nuances here that I feel trapped in if you could chime a thought it will be soooooo helpful. I cant afford counseling... which I honestly would love. To personify it I feel like I am in a dark ditch in my habits and environmental influences growing up that makes it hard for me to connect and find a best friend or create any real interactions. I am a 24 year old who hasn't had a real best friend since elementary besides the only one who truly knows me my boyfriend, that I have been dating for 5 years now. I say real because I believed I gave up when I thought this girl I connected with really well was my best friend in middle school 8th grade we literally hung out everyday at school and my pops and I gave her a couple rides home before but once we entered freshmen year high school she just hung out with her older friends and acted like our bond didn't exist.... I know when I say my boyfriend is my best friend its not like we are stuck to doing everything together. We both are very independent people who believe in keeping a social life outside of each other for our own health.
The problem here is that I can not find anyone to have a super close bond with like bff. I had this mentality of having to survive alone and be contempt with being alone in high school because of the above encounter with my so called best friend. Also, the alone mentality largely is influenced from my sheltering mother who always did not want me to have a social life because she was scared of outside influences.... This problem with my mom and parents in general run deep, I will touch on it more.....
I have recently tried to make a closer connection to some of my friends in my dance team during college but ..... its always me who calls us out to hang out again and putting an extra limb out there to get us together... No one else calls the shots unless it was a specific photo project or dance video they wanted to shoot and asked me to be a part of it. which we do get good social connections after those practices etc but its never the social friendship that is the purpose first....
At this point I feel like am I just not interesting and am I boring or something... I get it im like an old lady who isn't super adapt to how the millennials or gen z young adults my age who socialize with their social media apps like instagram, facebook, twitter, snapchat, or tiktok .... but am I just this awkward alien no one can relate to or want to relate tooooo......
I have issues of social anxiety as well. I feel and believe I am just socially inept. Once I started dating my boyfriend right now I realized how uncultured and sheltered I am..... I know he loves me for my kindness, thoughtfulness, ambitions and good nature (I'm not glorifying myself I just know I am a decent being) but he has never been able to have a good long conversation with me about anything pop culture like marvel, old kung fu moves, video games, or anime.... I just am not as cultured at all about anything pop culture and that's a part of my problems with conversating with others even if I try I just feel like phony studying to know this stuff..... He is a huge sociable nerd with a kind and open heart so I think he just loves me for my moral attributes.
Why am I so uncultured? Well I live in America but I am a first generation so my parents pretty much did not grow up here in the states and actually don't feel like this is there home. They actually don't feel like Americans yet they just live here and are trying to survive as minorities of a small ethnicity who doesn't have their own country. They don't want to know the culture here. On top of that I can say just by pure fact that my parents are self isolated people from any real close connections with even their own family and any friends they may have from work. My parents suffer from there own unwillingness to socialize and learn from others... They won't even talk to my boyfriend except for hi which everyone I know thinks is odd. Too sum it up my parents didn't allow me, a girl, in our family to join after school clubs, sports, sleep over at cousins house, or hang out at my friends houses. I was and still am a bit of a rebel. I did all of that got myself in the basket ball team in elementary, went over to friends places afterschool here and there and every time my mom told me to stop with a grand scolding. She never supported any of it. She didn't want me to have friends she told all my aunts and cousins that I was bad kid because of I was being social.... She painted such a bad picture of me and my cousins and aunts didn't know how to feel they actually believed it.... This honestly made me depressed and I gave in freshman year in high school because my friends at the time made fun of it more so or brushed it off too that I had to lie to my mom or be scolded every time just to go to the movies with them or hang out at their houses during elementary/middle school. This time frame I became introverted stayed home and watched tv or stuck to the pc screen.
As a family it is just standard that we didn't have any visitors ... from family (aunts, uncles, cousins, or grandparents) only once in a blue moon..... My father is not a bright guy no matter what we try my mom is the overworking brain of the family. I didn't realize it till I was in middle school but all my uncles and aunts didn't/couldn't connect with my dad because he isn't bright... They didn't want to socialize with him because it isn't pleasurable... It is sad because I wasn't treated the same by uncles and aunts on my dads side as my cousins where and I think its cause they viewed my brother and I as my dad someone they don't look at as equal etc..... On top of that my parents just work and came home never looked at me and my brother as real people to conversate with just people they have to help survive and that's the only love they know. They don't want to get to know us like real people even to this day they seldom tell us personal stories of theirs etc. I just grew up sheltered and feel unable to make a good impression to keep a friend/close bond with others. ...
I always knew I naturally crave for social interactions as a kid who liked to talking and playing with others but... growing up in a unsupportive household on those sort of things just ..... made me turn into someone I never wanted to be. I do have social anxiety even with some cousins of mine I can't connect to them.. I can't seem to hold a good conversation with like 80 % of the people I meet. This has lowered my self esteem so much. I feel I can't connect with anyone because I have been sheltered and then started sheltering myself throughout my life...
Anyone outside looking at me believes of me as an optimist who is strong and independent but this is a real problem of mine that eats at me everyday in my adult life...... Its depressing for me, I have begun to have slight suicidal thoughts for the past 2 years because I just feel trapped and cowardly.
Let me explain my depression and sadness episodes. There is this mutual friend of my boyfriend and I, who is my boyfriend's best friend since high school. He is a very social guy who gets everyone's attention and he came to befriend me superficially from a college class we had together until I started dating my boyfriend now, his bestfriend then he got to know me more for the past 5 years. His interpretation of me at first before dating his bestfriend was that I was sociable, confident and an extrovert. As he has gotten to see me and know me a bit more because of my relationship with his best friend he has come to see my social awkwardness with others and how I can't actually connect with others.... This is so sad. He hasn't told me that specifically to me but I know it from his blunt character. He doesn't enjoy conversations with me every time we are stuck together alone. I would try to bring up topics that maybe we can talk about but he usually cuts me off with doing something like grabbing more water or receiving a text etc... then we just end up talking about something else and then we both just cant seem to relate on anything... It is mostly me running out of things to elaborate on or I just don't know things... then my boyfriend comes back and they continue on with there chit chat ....
At times like this I want to just vanish and stop this never ending cycle throughout my adulthood of having social anxiety and inability to have connections/conversations....I just want to hideaway and not have to face any of it because even though I have tried to put myself out there through joining different dance studios and teams or trying get to know someone new at a social hang I just end up being the odd one no one really wants to talk to unless I am the only one in the room........
If you made it here thank you for reading. I literally just needed to put this out I haven't told anyone about these feelings..... I really want a counselor but I can't afford it. Any help and insight is appreciated.