Auto Parts: 92 Olds Cutlass transmission, olds cutlass, forward gears

Question
My automatic '92 Olds Cutlass will not move forward in 1st gear.  Reverse works fine, and if I get a rolling start forward, once the car is going 20 mph or so the forward gears do work.  In an attempt to fix this, I just changed the transmission fluid and filter, and with the car on jackstands and the engine running as I shift from park to reverse I can feel the torque on the wheels (with the brakes on) but as I shift from neutral to drive, there is nothing.  If I let off the brake in drive the wheels will slowly spin and if I apply the gas it will eventually get up to 20 mph and from there it works good.  I did also notice that with the brakes off the wheels will spin at idle the same speed as when the car was in drive.
Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks

Answer
    You have got what is called a wore-out transmission.  These front-wheel drive GM cars rarely go past 10 years without needing to have the transmission rebuilt.  I would take it to a good mechanic for a second look, but the piston that engages first gear is not exerting enough pressure on the band/clutch.  It could be a systemic problem, and the pump is bad, but either way it needs fixing.  And, frankly, at this age I'm not sure that a repair would be cost-effective.  You need to get an opinion of the health of the engine and any other expensive-to-fix systems (e.g. A.C., etc.), and compare that to the blue book value of the car.  If it costs more to fix than buy, then sell it to an optimist and buy something different with the money you would have used to repair it.  You could even get something a little more interesting than a Cutlass (not hard to do).  Think about an older car; if you shop around you can probably find a low-mileage car from the early '80's that will cost a lot less to repair when it breaks.  Get your mechanic to look at first, though.