Preview course and lesson before it’s published

I’m in the process of developing a course on a site that is live. I want to be able to preview my lessons without making the course publicly visible.

If I view the course, it says I need to be registered to view it. When I try to add a user through the admin section, it says it added my account as a student, but it doesn’t actually get added.

If I publish the course, but make it private, the same result occur.

I haven’t tried publishing the course with a password, because I would prefer it to not be visible at all to other people until I am ready for it to be made available.

What are the steps that are expected for a person to create a course and be able to preview the material while creating it, while not making it visible on their site? Thanks.