PowerShell script - Excel workbook not closing

I have used VBScript + task scheduler to automate Excel VBA launches and it works good, aside of some annoyances related to random PowerQuery issues stopping the script flow. Testing the transition from VBScript to more modern PowerShell and running the script below.

It opens the workbook and runs VBA code fine but I'm not able to close the workbook. What am I missing here?

$excel = New-Object -comobject Excel.Application  

$FilePath = 'mypath\myfile.xlsm'
$workbook = $excel.Workbooks.Open($FilePath)  

$excel.Visible = $true  

$excel.Run("Pad_check")

$workbook.Close()
$excel.Quit()

Remove-Variable excel
exit

Much more VBScript-based Excel automation instructions available compared to PowerShell.

This code seems to hang on $workbook.Close() and not even produce an error. If I remove this line, Excel asks for workbook saving confirmation ($excel.Quit() seems to work) - this is a no-go for automated flow anyway.

How to properly close workbook first and then Excel application (as is common practice with VBScript)? I could possibly overcome this with ThisWorkBook.Saved = True statement in VBA and not need to close the workbook separately, but trying to understand how to do this elegantly in PowerShell.

You've mentioned that you have used Power Query. If the Power Queries are running in the background then control will probably have returned to the macro and thence to the script, before the queries have completed. You cannot close a workbook while a Power Query is refreshing.
The solution is to ensure that the power queries are not configured to run in the background. You can use Data, Queries & Connections, then select the Properties of all of your Power Queries one by one and untick the Background Query or you can use the following code - call SetAllQueriesBackground False

Sub SetAllQueriesBackground(Optional setOn As Boolean = False)
'Sets the BackgroundQuery setting for all queries in the workbook
'setOn = True sets BackgroundQuery = True
'As default PQ behaviour is to set this on, default behaviour for this function is to turn it off

    Dim objConnection As Object
    For Each objConnection In ThisWorkbook.Connections
        objConnection.OLEDBConnection.BackgroundQuery = setOn
    Next

End Sub

Adding false-parameter to $workbook.Close($false) solved the issue. Thank you @Super Symmetry - sorry, don't think I can mark comment as solution.