Was driving my ranger and the engine overheated and made a very loud noise while driving it home. It also has no power. Not sure where to start. Checked the oil and no evidence of coolant and no evidence of oil. Did pull the water pump off and impeller was not attached (not sure if it was supposed to be) and there is what looks like grease in the housing. Any ideas where to begin to start getting it going again?

 

Welcome to the forum

What year ranger and what engine size?

"Did pull the water pump off and impeller was not attached.........."
Not a good thing, yes impeller needs to be attached to the shaft or no coolant is circulated

Overheated...........gauge went above 1/2, above 3/4, up to Hot?
How long was it there?
Did you shut off the engine as soon as you noticed it getting hot?

" made a very loud noise while driving it home...." so I assume you drove it hot, you should never do that, an engine will cool off if you shut it off so no damage done, just FYI, you can then restart it after an hour or so, add water and drive it a little farther, limp home

Loud noise.......metallic or maybe a hose breaking under pressure????

" Checked the oil and no evidence of coolant and no evidence of oil.", so no oil shows on the dip stick?
Thats a very bad sign

At best if you drove it more than 5 minutes when overheated then you have blown a head gasket and most likely cracked a head, two if V6 engine
At worst you have thrown a rod(the loud noise), which means replace engine.

Pull out the spark plugs and try to crank the engine over with starter motor, see if it is seized up(bearings melted and welded to crank)
If engine cranks do a compression test, write down results

 

yups what Ron said. Gauges and warning lights are there for a reason.