No Park...bad pawl..or Linkage issue

Is this normal to do without removing the tranny from the car? As understand you have to remove the bolts, then remove the rear trans mount and there are two philips head screws on the tailshaft holding on a metal plate. After removing the screws and the plate, under it is an access hole to get at the clip on the tailshaft support bearing. Ive gotta remove that clip with a snap ring pliers set. That about right? or am i missing something?

It's normal to do if it's the pawl or rod knob, but otherwise the pan has to come off.
There is only the linkage end of the rod after that but it's pretty rare for that end to break without loosing the control of the whole shifting thing.

Sounds like you have a good grip on what it takes to get to it.
Speedo cable is only other thing I can think of besides the driveline.