Whatever this is under the dash on the right side of my steering just started knocking when I first start the car and now while I’m driving. My bf unplugged it and it stopped but we don’t know what it is. Any ideas?

 

That's the air mix motor. I had this same problem. You don't want to unplug it, whatever position it's in, you'll get no hot or cold air now. You need to take it off, open it up carefully, remove debris and apply silicone paste then the problem will go away.

 

member skirmish has a write up on how to fix these for the MDX, it's pretty much the same for the TL