Help please 87 ranger timing issue

[sidewinder]

hi everyone im new to this forum. I am in the middle of my first head gasket job. i have a haynes manual which is not very much help. i am extremely confused on how to set the timing. when i aligned the TC mark on the timing cover to the arrow on the crank pulley, the paint marks on the cam did not line up nor did the distributor rotor point to the #1 terminal. Further more i put a screw driver in the #1 spark plug hole to find true tdc and NOTHING(crank TC mark included) lines up as it should according to the manual. i am definetly on the compression stroke b/c i could feel air coming out of the spark plug hole. the truck ran alright before i took it apart. I am totally lost. can i take the head off without anything aligned( if its in tdc via the screwdriver trick). any help with be GREATLY appreciated. Please share your thoughts. has this ever happened to anyone else?