I have WordPress 6.0.2 installed on my Windows 10 machine, and am teaching myself to use it via an online course. I'm also using the Local application to create and manage the individual WordPress sites I'm creating as part of the course. I am doing all the development locally, with the goal of eventually re-doing my existing hand-coded website presently hosted on a 3rd party host, i.e., I'm not hosting anything on WordPress.com and don't intend to. Most things seem pretty straightforward.
However, backup is baffling me. I know that each site's themes, plugins, etc. are stored in C:\Users\[user_name]\Local Sites\[individual WordPress site name] and its various subfolders, and so I've included the entire C:\Users\[user_name]\Local Sites\ folder tree in my regular backup routines. But I've also read that I must separately backup the database for each site that stores the site's blog posts, user information and other content. The Local application reports that the sites are using MySQL 8.0.16 as their database, but I can't find any MySQL folders in C:\Program Files, C:\Program Files (x86), C:\ProgramData, C:\, or anywhere else. There is also no evidence whatsoever that MySQL is actually installed (i.e., no Start Menu entries, no desktop icons, and no references in Control Panel/Programs and Features). I want to include the database files in my backup routines, but am not sure where they are. Does anyone have a clue where they might be?
P.S. Each of the C:\Users\[user_name]\Local Sites\[individual WordPress site name]\app\sql folders has a local.sql file, which contains a SQL script to drop, rebuild and re-populate a number of tables. These files are updated ONLY when the associated WordPress site is stopped via the Local application. Is this what passes for a MySQL backup, or am I correct to be expecting something else?