I just fought this battle!

I did not realize the small part that goes in first had fallen out. We put it all back together and attempted to bleed the brakes but the pedal never felt right.
My 16 year old who is about to get a learner's permit took the first test drive. Fortunately he asked "what do I do if the brakes don't work." I told him to use the hand brake and turn off the ignition, that is exactly what he did and a good learning experience.

Realizing what a pain it was to pull and replace the master cylinder I decided this time to remove the plastic trim piece in front of it. Two nuts let me remove the AC air intake/filter housing. Then two plastic nuts and three bolts, all pretty easy to access, and the piece came it. This made is so much easier to get to the two nuts that hold on the master Cylinder as well as the two brake lines. Well worth the extra effort and eliminated a lot of dropped nuts and most of the cursing!

I put white lithium grease on the three parts that are supposed to magically stay in place when you put on the master cylinder and voila it worked. I wish I had done it this way in the first place. I would have noticed the part that was out place as you can actually see in the booster.

Good luck!
David