So apparently the issue is my OS, [link|https://old.reddit.com/r/calculators/comments/52od74/ti83_f1f5_keys_not_working/|according to this Reddit post] ([link|https://archive.ph/2kUXI|archive] for posterity).
My calculator is on 2.43 whereas the version that utilizes the function keys is 2.53+.
Kind of weird that they’ll manufacture a calculator with keys that don’t work straight out of the box until later versions, but at least I have my answer.
Currently I’m not able to update my calculator, however with a little digging I found out that [link|https://www.desmos.com/calculator|Desmos’ graphing calculator] is able to do logBase stuff (you can find it by bringing up the on-screen keyboard that Desmos provides, clicking on the “Functions” button, and then looking in the misc. tab, the logBase button looks like the log button but with a subscript '''''a''''' next to it). Hopefully this will be useful to those in the future who stumble upon this post. :)