SupraTL

tranny and is the one part with ball joint supposed to twist when the shifter is moved back and forth or is it supposed to stay rigid and shift our car?

If the nut that connects that part to the transmission is loose will this cause the car to not shift into gear?

lemieux@curbside

if so you need to look at what exactly is wrong .. 2 things next to each other are the ball-joint and the nut that hold the shifter rod in place.. sounds like one of the m is loose.
you can't manually shift unless you get your hand on the little **** that come out of the tranny .. that is hard to reach .
see the long shift rod on the driver side of the tranny - at the end of it you have the ball joint (covered by the orange boot) and the nut in the very end.

<img src="http://pictureposter.audiworld.com/38083/cimg2032.jpg">

SupraTL

gears does nothing. Everything seems to be connected on the linkage.

SupraTL

Thanks for your help, it was priceless.