BMW Repair: 1997 740i e38 auto tranny not working, bentley repair manual, shift lever

Question
well when I parked my car it would not go into park. the dash showed it was stuck in 3rd gear. i was able to move the shift lever to park so i could turn the car off, but it was hard. I have a peak tool and it showed no error codes or faults and there were no error warning lights either. I noticed no obvious leaks in tranny area and there were no strange vibrations, shimmy, smells or noises prior to this happening. The car appears to be in neutral since when you push the car it rolls freely. I tried moving the shifter to neutral and park which made no difference, the car still rolls freely. I did notice a couple times that the shifter moved stiffly when placing in park. I just figured it was in bad need of a cleaning from spills.  can you please help with a fix or diagnosis.

thank you for your time and efforts

Answer
Pure guesses on this one......

Sounds like either your linkage or your sensors are off.  Since it says it's in park but appears to be in neutral, I'll assume the linkage is bound/bent/worn.

Two options:  Buy a Bentley repair manual for this (the e38 came out less than a year ago, and is excellent).  Spend a lot of time working through the details.  Or take it to a dealership.  Too nice of car to screw around with this being bad.