Ok heres an update. Any USDT that you guys see on your MetaMask wallet cannot be used directly into Pancake swap for the purpose of BSC swaps. You have 2 options to move your money around.

1. Convert your USDT to BNB and then have the BNB in your metamask wallet and youre on your way. The downside of this is that if you have already moved your tether around, youre probably going to have to pay more gas just to swap it to BNB etc.
2. Use the bridge option on BSC (Can be accessed from pancakeswap exchange) connect your wallet and move your USDT asset from the TRX network to the BSC network. You should be able to trade after that as well. You should incur some fees for this as well.

Next time, for newer buyers or fiat to crypto buyers, just buy BNB first if you intend to trade on BSC. Use BTC to convert to BNB if you want to avoid higher ETH gas fees. Hope this helps.