I grew up eating them and cook them often to this day. I just would not personally call that frying in the same way I would not call vegetables, meat, etc. cooked with a similar ratio of oil to veggie fried. Or at least where I'm from frying implies submerging in hot oil, but it could be a regional thing. And true, we still call them fried or refried beans.

Interestingly some variations of the recipe with higher oil ratios for special occasions like birthdays we call "frijoles chinitos" which kind of translates to "shivering/goosebumps beans" since their texture changes to mimic skin when shivering with little dots after cooking. Not sure how the chinito (curly when referring to hair) part comes in since hair is more straight than curly on those conditions...)