Shimmy in my steering column, Toyota says Duh

I've had my first really bad experience with Toyota, both dealership and Corporate. I have a 2002 Prius. Within the last year, on starting up in cold weather and turning my steering wheel, the most wicked shimmy occurs. A cousin in law in California who owns a Prius had the same problem and sent us a copy of a notice of the defect. Today I brought in the car to the dealership, having made the appointment 4 days ago to enable them to order the parts for the recall work (battery and I thought the drive shaft problem). Toyota dealership didn't have the battery. When we told them we had been told on monday to bring it in on Thursday so the part would be available, they simply said, Oh yeah, what was the person's name. When we asked about the recall on concerning the drive shaft shimmy, they said, Never heard of it.
When I called customer service at Toyota Corporate, he said, Nope, no recall for your car number. I told him we had seen a notice. He said not for our vin number. I asked who I could talk to to find out who else has had this problem or how many might have it, how many it takes to trigger a recall, he said "Ya can't talk to anyone, no one has that information, we won't give you that information, you just have to trust us that if something is wrong, we will tell you. Thank you Big Brother!
So I'm wondering why Prius owners in California have gotten notice of this problem, but not the rest of the country and I'm wondering if anyone else has had a similar experience.
Any help would be appreciated!
Anita

 

Dear Rick,
Thanks so much for your reply and the information. Not suprisingly, the customer service droid told me that my warrantee was up and no work on the steering would be covered by warrantee. Needless to say, you have helped me enormously.
Thanks.
A.

 

BTW,
I wondered if you might know how I might go about finding out how many of these complaints were lodged with toyota and/or how many replacements were done.
Since the CS person was so insistent that the problem didn't exist and that such datat could not be obtained, I would take some satisfaction in gather the info and sharing it with him.
Anita