Can't see Android Emulator when apparently it already is running
following Robert's advice I opted to install a copy of Genymotion Personal Edition and linked it to Android Studio via the Genymotion Plugin that was available to install.
see here for installing: https://www.techbeamers.com/genymotion-emulator/
If you do not see an additional icon pop up like described in the page then you will want to (in the case of versions around 3.6.3) enable the Toolbar via View&gt;Appearance&gt;Toolbar
This seems to at least link up fine for me with Android Studio, but overall does not really answer the question as to why the emulator via AVD does not function.
If no one seems to be able to share that knowledge, then I suppose will pick this one as the best answer.
Thanks to Robert again for mentioning Genymotion.