windows 7 phone unlocking

I am an old-timer trying to learn new tricks. Specifically developing an app for the windows phone. I am running VS2010-express for phone development and put together a few apps using the windows 7 phone emulator that comes with it. Having decided to see what a real device looks like I bought an unlocked used AT&T (no sim card) LG C-900 windows 7 phone. When I plug it into a usb port drivers load successfully but unlike my android phone the windows phone does not show up as a drive in windows explorer. A popup appears that says I need 'Zune'. When I deploy my app to a device, not the emulator, it does not deploy and says I need to install the 'Zune' software. I install Zune and now I taken via an error message url to the windows phone dev center where I learn that I must join a live group and register my phone via the 'windows phone developer registration' tool. I join, get the tool, and run it and it fails because of the date/time not to its liking. I set the date/time and now it fails logging into the "developer portal". I can logon to the developer portal ok with the same credentials. I see an application deployment tool and thinking it may be like the android adb tool i get it and try it. It fails because the device is not developer unlocked. All I want to do is play. Is there a hack that will let me load an app into my phone?