I see your issue. It’s basically because you have started with a ‘Grid element’ instead of a standard Div element. If you would like to convert it over to a div, then use flex it will sort the issue.
I understand your thoughts on IE, however, this is a dying platform and shouldn’t be accommodated for unless the client has a large majority of users on the website using this software. For my sites, we have a message that pops up to instruct users to use, a modern browser if they happen to still use IE. Grid is awesome and shouldn’t be overlooked because less than 1% of people still use it. But that’s just my thoughts
If you remove the grid element and place all the objects inside a div and flex it, it will get rid of your spacing issue! Hope that helps!