What does "in practice been forbidden" mean? Out of fashion and out of favor, sure.
Some bishops have attempted to ban, e.g., ad orientem, but the operative law from Rome (under the previous pontificate, but still in force AFAIK) is that a bishop cannot ban a licit option -- which ad orientem definitely is -- in the liturgy "just because he wants it that way". (Setting aside something like banning communion in both kinds due to the threat of a communicable illness.)
(On the topic of ad orientem specifically, the animus against it goes back to a passage in the General Instruction of the Roman Missal which was mistranslated from the Latin to say that "the celebration of Mass facing the people ... is to be preferred wherever possible". A careful study of the Latin genders of words shows that it clearly says "freestanding altars ... are to be preferred wherever possible" and the context refers to new construction, not requiring the wreckovation of old churches.)
If it had been available I do not believe that there would have been such interest in the old Mass.
The TLM fans will disagree with you on that one. For many people, you might be right.
Maybe I'm "too close to the action" as a church musician, but restoring Gregorian chant, traditional hymnody, ad orientem, and the use of the altar rail do a lot to make the NO tolerable.