Some of my parameters are editable and some are not, the grayed out ones can not even be deleted, I can only change the parameter name and a few check boxes. Is there a way to to make the grayed out one editable… I imagine it is a reference but I can not find a way to break the reference.

the grayed ones are part of the asset definition so you have to edit the definition to change them (RMB/Type Properties… or Assets/Edit Asset Properties/…)

you probably opened Edit Parameter Interface… so you are just editing parameters of a single asset instance in your scene aka spare parameters, so if your intention was to update your HDA interface do it through above mentioned way

EDIT: if it's not your HDA you obviously wouldn't want to do it as changing it would change every single instance of that type

That was it! Thank you Tamte.