Hello, Can you answer a transmission question for me please?

At 180,000 miles my transmission failed and had a used on put in. From the very first day it was put in you had to get the RPM's up to over 2500 to get it to start rolling forward before it would "catch" and slowly take off and then it would be fine. I took it back to the guy that put it in and he told me that it had to be driven like a manual tranny using the shifter in first, then second ect. It works fine like that but very annoying. He says because its a used tranny you cant match it up exactly and can do nothing for me. Is there something like a tourque converter that could be the issue? There was also another thing that concerned me, When you look at the concole for the shifter, as I always remembered the light around the gear you were dring in was illuninated in green and since the tranny change it is now red. What do you think? Thanks
Tom