Something like the following might help get you started. Call it with the prompt and list of words. It'll return either undef or the word selected in scalar context. In list context it will also return the reply entered by the user. (To preserve the $REPLY functionality of the ksh builtin.) It preserves my ksh's interpretation of input which allows trailing characters after the number.

sub ksh_like_select {
  my $prompt     = shift;
  my @words      = @_;
  my $retval;
  my $reply;

  do {
    my $i = 1;
    print STDERR $i++, ")\t$_\n" for @words;
    print $prompt;
    $reply = <STDIN>;
  } while ($reply eq '');

  if ($reply =~ /^(\d+)/ and $1 > 0 and $1 <= @words) {
      $retval = $words[$1-1];
  }

  wantarray() ? ($retval,$reply) : $retval;
}
[download]

-sauoq
"My two cents aren't worth a dime.";