73' duster wont start after dropping steering column

Hey guys, this is my first post, so I apologize if it's not up to the usual standard, and for my rambling, I'm just tryna make sure you guys got all the details, you can skip to where I say "HERES MY QUESTIONS" if you'd like. I got my 1973 Plymouth duster (318, auto, HVAC) at the beginning of lockdown, and it has been a blast, girls dig it, old dudes at home depot love it, and it always starts an awesome convo, but recently my wiring has been down the drain, one night on a midnight Cruze back from downtown, pretty much all electrical systems, other than my ignition, completely shut off, no stereo, so gauges, no headlights, nothing. scary I know, first inclination is to test the alternator, so the next day I start her up and everything works again, but as soon as I give 'er some gas? back to nothing, so I drive to AutoZone and have them check my alternator, they say the voltage regulator is toast, not knowing that older cars have the voltage regulator separate from the alternator, I swap in a new alternator, and BAM! shes going good again, I drive her to turkey run in Daytona and back (total of 5 hours of driving) and drove her on the weekends no problem, but then car show season ended and she's back under covers, so this season I get her back out, and nothing working again, but I noticed my amp meter on the dash is maxed out when all my electronics are dead, and then, smoke, and the worst part is, I'm on the highway, 30 mins from home, so I get off at the next exit and take out my aftermarket stereo, and she's hot enough to cook an egg. after that horrible situation, none of my gauges work, period. and its a day before another show, so I read from a post here that I gotta check the voltage regulator, so I pick one up and all that jazz looks good now, but the gauges arent working still, not even working at idle like before, drop the steering column to take the instrument cluster out, I take the 3 bolts out and she drops just enough to get the instrument cluster out, I clean and test everything and it all looks good, so I slap everything back together, and nothing, no starter, no accessories, nothing.
After a bit of learning from older posts and 7-year-old youtube videos, I learned how to get the starter going, but that's just jumping the starter, where does everything else fall into place?
HERE MY QUESTIONS:
1:after dropping the steering column is there some ground wire or something that im forgetting to put back into place?
2:could that faulty voltage regulator have led to my instrument problems?
3:I was already quite adamant on making a pushbutton style ignition system, could routing new wire to something like that (and bypassing most of the factory in-cabin wiring) fix my issues?
4:could dropping the steering column cause the neutral safety switch to stop my car from starting?
sorry for the super long post, I'm quite new to this stuff and don't really have many mopar people around me other than my old man, and he's know just as much as I do (nothing)

Thanks again,
Blaize.