I'm typing this disagreement to your statement on a touchscreen with fingernails only

Did you use metallic nail polish? Or is your skin just barely not making contact with the screen?

I'm someone who never puts any sort of product on my finger nails, and I can confirm that my nails work on my iPhone screen, both when I've lazily forgotten to cut them, letting them get annoyingly long, and if I turn my finger over so that my nail is just about flat on the screen - I checked while writing this, and confirmed the screen was responsive despite my skin definitely not touching it. (I'm a man who doesn't have any experience growing my nails to extend more than a few mm beyond my finger tips so I can't speak to that scenario.)