tl;dr: click continue at to reset my password from a device I recently used to sign in and answer the not-very-secure questions presented to you, they will send you a mail.

long version

After reading this answer by icantchooseoneRising:

icantchooseoneRising Nov 2 with there being around 450 million gmail users , there is no number to call if you use free gmail nor any direct email or other type of tech support - its simply not possible

You can only reset your password by one of these methods:

1. Having email sent to a recovery email address that you have registered in your account

2. Having a code sent to the mobile number you have registered in your account

3. For some accounts, answering a security question.

4. filling in the recovery form

for 1 2 3 click here

select I forgot my password

for 4

Start here - www.google.com/accounts/recovery

Choose "I forgot my password"

Enter the account name that you are trying to recover

Solve the Captcha if one is offered to you

Choose "Verify your Identity"

Complete and submit the form

for more info See the following article about how to recover a lost or compromised account: http://gmailaccountrecovery.blogspot.com/

I've decided to try and click continue on to reset my password from a device I recently used to sign in, well, I've used my computer...

to my surprise it asked me to enter the last password you remember

then it asked to Enter an email address where we can contact you - note that it didn't ask what is my 'recovery email address' (neither it should, based on my username they should know already), nor even my username...

After that it asked me again what was my last password, the date when the last tiem I could log in (today..), and the date when I registered my account (ages ago...).

I don't know what to think but it sent the recovery email to the address I've given.

I was able to recover my account.

On the first login, it tried to trick me again into giving my email address, but there was a "cancel" button...

Now I wonder if it didn't enter to this form the same address that is my recovery email address, would it still send the help email? Because then I think it is very insecure.

The reason why they don't allow me to log in with my password should be that someone else may be knowing my last password. So they can enter it too.

They ask for an other email address, not my username nor my recovery email address. If I could give any address here, then the remaining questions are the last time I could use my account, which is not very hard to guess if someone is an attacker; and when did I register. This one can be tricky, but really, there are not many combinations. With a little inspection, information and luck, one could make an educated guess.

So it seems what actually protects my account the strongest is my last password - the very thing that Google wants me to change. But until I change that, it seems that it may allow anyone with a random email address to take over my account, if [s]he can guess the time I've registered?!

Okay, this question is still getting a lot of views so I figure it's a good idea to post up the solution for my case at least.

What was happening, is regardless of my Gmail settings, Windows Live Mail was taking over and moving emails back into my spam, even if I used the "Never send to spam" filter as recommended by AI E.

To this this, I took the following steps:

1. In Windows Live Mail click the Tools menu, and then click Junk e‑mail Options.

2. Select the protection level you want. In my case I did No automatic filtering which just lets Gmail manage the spam folder entirely on it's own.

More info here: http://windows.microsoft.com/en-gb/windows-vista/block-spam-and-other-unwanted-e-mail

Hopefully other people find this useful too.

It sounds stupid but I just never thought for a second that Windows Live Mail would so aggressively manage my spam folder, particularly not to constantly move any mail back to the spam after I've flagged it as safe.