How to authenticate circleci/helm to upgrade_helm_chart?

I was trying to use the circleci/helm orb to upgrade a chart on an kubernetes cluster deployed on aws. the steps go like this:
- aws-cli/setup:
aws_access_key_id: AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID
aws_secret_access_key: AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY
- aws-eks/update-kubeconfig-with-authenticator:
cluster-name: my-test
install-kubectl: true
- helm/upgrade_helm_chart:
chart: “helm”
dry_run: true
namespace: “my-ns”
release_name: “my-release”
reuse_values: true
values_to_override: “image.tag=latest”

the job failed with an error “Error: Kubernetes cluster unreachable: the server has asked for the client to provide credentials”

I have AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID and AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY environment variable set up properly, as I was able to push images to ECR using them.

Does anyone know how to authenticate helm with kubernetes on aws? thanks!