Shifter lever arm issue

[chris1993]

A while back I was backing into my garage in my 1990 AOD fox i went from reverse to drive so I could pull forward a bit next thing I know my entire shifter lever arm is wiggling all over the place and not making the car change gears when I moved it up and down the prndl I got after the car put it in Netural by hand and tore apart my shifter turns out the nut that holds the gear selector arm to the threaded stud with the slot the gear selector arm arm rides on was gone not sitting at bottom of shifter but completely missing i pulled the shifter got a new nut went to put it back on but now the gear selector arm will not slide back into the little grove that it rides on so I can put the nut on, if I flip the arm around to fa e the wrong way it will but with the gear selector arm facing the proper way it will not fully seat onto the little groove.
Am I doing something wrong?

 

[Rcdgl]

I think you will have to drop the pan, and perhaps the valvebody to reinstall the shift lever. I know thats the case on a C4, and would believe it to be true for an AOD. Google an AOD rebuild video. Not hard to do on a C4, AOD should be similar.