On to the good stuff :-)

To get this working (locally) login to the database server, presuming that
it is running; otherwise read /etc/rc.d/rc.mysqld first; to make the DB:

# mysql -uroot -p
> CREATE DATABASE nss_mysql;

After this is done it has to be populated with the user tables; there is
an example for them provided in /usr/doc/nss-mysql-1.0/sample.sql

You can copy that to say /tmp, (probably) edit it some, and insert it with:

# mysql -uroot -p -D nss_mysql < /tmp/sample.sql

After this is done create the 'nss' and 'nss-shadow' database users with
statements such as the ones found in /usr/doc/nss-mysql-1.0/SHADOW
And make sure the passwords for them in /etc/nss-{mysql,mysql-root}.conf
match up...

Now edit your /etc/nsswitch.conf to look like the -mysql version and try
the following commands:

getent passwd
getent shadow

Which should list the users pulled from mysql!
(Otherwise have a look at 'tail /var/log/syslog' for hints on how to fix it).

-Menno.