I am not a moderator and to the best of my knowledge have not yet had a post deleted.  However, I would like to respond to your suggestion.
I agree that effective communication is usually a sign of courtesy and a good way to minimise misunderstandings.
However, if you consider the practicalities of your suggestion, I think there may be a problem. If a post is deemed to be inappropriate and the moderators send a PM, do they then wait for a response before they delete it, thus leaving an inappropriate post visible possible for quite some time?
As for making the poster aware of what is acceptable, wouldn't you assume that if your post is deleted, then it has stepped over some line and if it is moved that it was in the wrong place.  What more evidence do you need?  If it isn't apparent to you why it was deleted, I guess you could always ask (politely of course), either on the thread or via a PM.
While I am not dismissing your comments about courtesy, I think it may be an unrealistic expectation.  As far as I know the moderators are all volunteers (although some may have been conscripted) and I expect that all of them have lives outside the AULRO forum.  I think that asking them to notify posters before deleting posts may be asking more than some of them have time to do.
I will concede that it is not impossible.  I recently received a PM telling me that a warning issued on a thread that was getting a bit personal was not directed at me.  I appreciated the effort that the moderator had made, but I think it would have been unreasonable of me to complain if it had not happened.
If you work on the assumption that the moderators sometimes have a difficult decisions to make and that they make a genuine effort to keep everyone happy and the forum running smoothly, you will be pretty close to the mark.  They may not keep all of the people happy all of the time, but I think they make a genuine effort and do a pretty good job.  The moderators cut us a fair bit of slack most of the time.  I think we should do the same for them.
EDIT:
I just read you last comment more carefully and it appears that you may be doing just as I suggested.  After all your post is more of a clarification than a complaint. 

 
			
		
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