I think that instead of having to SCROLL through my long list of keywords it would be super helpful to be able to have a search box within library metadata tab

Thanks, ​@johnrellis for that clarification. I should have added that myself, but sometimes I am guilty of thinking that everyone knows about the right-arrow.

Building on ​@dj_paige’s reply, hover the mouse over a keyword in the Keyword List panel and a right-arrow will magically appear to the right of the keyword. Click that right-arrow to filter by that keyword.

There is a “Filter Keywords” box in the Keyword List panel. You can type the keyword there, select the desired keyword in that panel and it will show up selected in the Filter Bar.