Starting with:
v = load('gong.mat');
audiowrite('gong.wav',v.y,v.Fs);
I would do either:
[y,Fs]=audioread('gong.wav');
Input_Signal = y;
or:
[Input_Signal,Fs]=audioread('gong.wav');
Both of these should work.
With respect to the rest, see the buttord and filtfilt function documentation for some valuable hints on how to filter a signal correctly.
.
