I don't, and never have worked for Google. This community is largely just Workspace admins from around the world helping each other. Googlers only very occasionally chime in.
It sounds like the person in question may have associated their xyz@yahoo.com address with their xyz@gmail.com Google account. See https://support.google.com/accounts/answer/176347 for the details of how that's done.
It's also entirely possible to create a consumer Gmail account with any email address, not just @gmail.com. See the "Use an existing email address" section of https://support.google.com/accounts/answer/27441
Google accounts in this regard are no different than accounts with any other online service (like Facebook, or your bank, or whatever)--it's often necessary to create an account before you can interact with that company's services.
Hope that helps.