Problems With Permalink changes causing 404 error

Okay, let me preface this by saying that I am using wordpress to replace an exiting site, so I am keeping the old html site in place while I set up the new site

I installed wordpress into a subfolder domain.tld/wp/ and set it up, when I had enough of it set up I wanted to get it running on the domain. So I followed the instructions and set the site address to the root, and then copied over the files requested…..except…..

There was no .htaccess file to copy (my root had one but not the wp file. And yes I know how to make them visibile

All of that is a preface to the fact that I cannot change the permalinks

I added this code to the existing .htacess file

# BEGIN WordPress
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteRule ^index\.php$ - [L]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-d
RewriteRule . /index.php [L]
</IfModule>

# END WordPress

And tried to reset change the permalinks (chmod was set to 777)

The result was being sent to the error page and the code in the .htacess file being changed to

# BEGIN WordPress

# END WordPress

So I know the program is changing the htaccess file, but not correctly

suggestions?