2002 prius owner

Hi there, I am new to this forum and I have a 2002 prius moonglow blue, and she is now a little over 95,000miles and about 5,000 miles ago the whole stereo stopped. I cant get the tape deck to play, I cant get the CDs to function, and I cant get the radio to work. I had my mechanic buddies all look at it, we looked at the fuse, we even took it to the dealer but they said to fix that, it would cost us over $1000 to fix it. I went to a junkyard and even found a model just like mine, but someone beat me to the part. does anyone know what that part is called? I know its a multifunction thing, but I dont know what the part is, and it bothers me when a friend comes in and I have to constantly remind them that the audio no longer works. The sound on the GPS still works, so we know its not the speakers. cor now I just use a speaker and an ipod, but I miss being able to turn on the radio and have people play tapes or CDs in it. The dealer also said it was known issue, but they never informed us about it before hand. also I heard strange beeps coming from the stereo system before it died, and it lasted just over 90,000, but the next morning when I started up the car and pressed on for the radio and turned it up, nothing happened. it just said Audio Off. any ideas? or where I can find that part?