1997 Escort Automatic Tranny Overdrive Shift is Touchy

[yoo-hoo]

Hope some one can help. I had a tranny replaced in my 1997 2.0L escort back in June of 2003. Car sat from then until today when I wanted to figure out why the fluid had leaked out. Put a new seal on the pan and all is well with the fluid. However, the gear shift (on the floor type) seems to have a little bit of play it. When it is in park the gear shift is loose and you can move it back and forth a bit. When i put it in reverse it goes right in, neutral goes right into gear too. When you put it in over drive it doesn't go into gear. There is the orange indicator on it which shows through the little window what gear your in, but when you line the orange line up with the overdrive it doesn't go in gear. You have to actually move it down a little more so its closer to being in just drive and over drive. Now when you move the gear shift to drive it works fine, as well as in Low. It is just in the over drive that the orange line doesn't line up. What is causing this? My brother-in-law thought it might be an adjusting screw or something under neath the console case surrounding the gear shift. The guy at Advance Auto Parts thinks it might be the cable going to the tranny. Any ideas? I haven't pulled apar the console case yet to see if there is a screw or anything...but just thought that there might be since the there is so much play in the gear shift when it's in park...it never used to be that loose.