resolved it, found the answer in another forum topic:
https://theeventscalendar.com/support/forums/topic/ticket-fieldsets-do-not-appear-unless-you-toggle-quantity/
I needed to revise code in tickets.php that was already customized in my theme/tribe-events/wootickets/
$input = woocommerce_quantity_input( array(
‘input_name’ => ‘quantity_’ . $ticket->ID,
‘input_value’ => 1,
‘min_value’ => 0,
‘max_value’ => $max_quantity,
), null, false );
now the field shows up automatically on page load ! YAY!