1997 A4 1.8TQ Automatic

This has just happened to my car:
http://forums.audiworld.com/showthread.php?t=284793

My version of the story goes as follows:
The car was running fine 3 hours ago, put my key in the ignition (maybe a bit awkwardly??) and went to turn it and heard a preliminary 'click'. I thought nothing of it and turned the rest of the way. The windshield wipers budged, but did not move after that. I suspected that the car sounded a bit funny, so I went to turn it off and the key was resistant to turning. I decided I wanted my key, so I removed it after some jiggling.

Went to start her up again and found that I needed a bit more torque on the key this time to turn it. She started, still sounding weird, so I shut her off. This time the key would not come out.

I turned the key on and went up and down the column with the gear selector a few times while the key was on, started it in park (sounding weird still maybe?) and put it in drive. She was fine at that point (still no low beams or wipers, but sounded normal and drove forward). Thinking that it was a fuse to blame for my headlights/wipers, I put the car in park and - SCREEEECH, neutral - SCREEEECH, D - fine.
Tested park again and got a screech. Fearing I would do less damage this way, I shut the car off while in drive and put the car in park with the key on to EASILY remove my key this time (wtf?).

I am scared - no one who has had this problem has ever been heard of again as far as I know. I do not wish to end up in this Audi Bermuda Triangle.

Any ideas?

 

http://auto-recalls.justia.com/audi/a4/1997/06v403000/

Thanks.