Why isn't my else condition being met...?

My menu opens fine with the below code, adds the open menu to the array, increasing it's size to 1. I do this so the close menu button will close the last menu opened first, working back. But after the first menu is opened, pressing the key (Esc) does nothing. Not even a print statement. Why is that, since the array size is no longer less than 1...?

func _input(event):
	if event.is_action_pressed("ui_game_menu"):
		print(open_menus)
		get_open_menus()
		print("size is: ", open_menus.size())
		if open_menus.size() < 1:
			var game_menu = load("res://UI/Game Menu.tscn").instance()
			add_child(game_menu)
			get_open_menus()
			print("size is: ", open_menus.size())
		else:
			print(open_menus[-1])
			open_menus[-1].queue_free()


func get_open_menus():
	open_menus = []
	for child in get_tree().get_nodes_in_group("menu"):
		if not self.is_a_parent_of(child):
			continue
		open_menus.append(child)
		print(open_menus)
	return open_menus```

cybereality

The script is in my Canvas Layer GUI, and the menu is a Control node child instanced to open. Seems I have to do more reading on focus (and mouse flags?)

The buttons inside the menu grab focus, and I never realized that could mean all input to other control nodes would be lost (though it makes sense since only one node can have focus). That's probably the case then.

Can I ask to clarify something? If it's one of the buttons inside the menu that has focus, does that mean each button should have the code (they are all instances of a single basic button scene, so that's not the issue, just want to understand) to handle the escape/close because the root of the scene won't ever receive it? The menu root never has focus. Something like the focused button emitting a signal to the menu root?

Sorry, I'm still learning a lot. And it seems something that seems as obvious as 'if -> else' isn't always so clear.

Cunningly, the buttons in question are inside the PlayerMenuButtons VBox. Though I suppose that's pretty obvious.