Jeremiah described a desolate earth in 4:23-26:  "I beheld the earth, and lo, it was without form, and void; and the heavens, and they had no light,  I beheld the mountains, and, lo, they trembled, and all the hills moved lightly.  I beheld, and, lo, there was no man and all the birds of the heavens were fled.  I beheld, and, lo, the fruitful place was a wilderness and all the cities thereof were broken down at the presence of the Lord, and by his fierce anger."

Had men been there?  If cities were broken down,  someone built them.  Birds fled.  Fruit no longer grew on trees.

Did this happen between Gen. l:1 and Gen. 1:2?   God doesn't tell us.  So there isn't much use in speculating.  Archeologists have found very old human bones.  How old?  Well, that depends on methods of dating--which are not very exact.  (More on this later.)

As far as I am concerned, the story of Genesis begins when God starts over.  When the sun breaks through the darkness and light allows trees to grow, birds to fly--when "The earth brought forth grass, the herb yielding seed and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so." Gen. 1:12

Gen. 1:13  And the evening and the morning were the third day.