WD My Book backup drive disappeared from desktop running Lion

WD My Book backup drive disappeared from desktop running Lion !0.7.5. Disk Utility recognized the drive and has repaired it, but it still does not show up on desktop or Time Machine. My Book also appears to hold zero data now (I've had it running backups for a couple of years). What's the problem? How to remedy?

I tried this but it did not help.  I did confirm that the external drive is working by connecting it to another IMac computer running Mavericks.  Not sure if the recent update to Yosemite that supposedly fixed issues with time machine has messed this up or not. Trying to work with WD as well to see which side the issues is on.   I remember a similar issue with Mavericks was updated making time machine unusable with the external drive.

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