The beginner mistake with MCP isn't installing too little — it's installing a dozen servers and wondering why the agent got slower and dumber. Here's the starter pantry: the three servers this kitchen actually runs every day, what each one earns, and what we deliberately left out.
We spent our first weeks saying API when we meant MCP, and our agent politely built the wrong thing. Here's the kitchen-terms explanation that finally stuck — an API is another kitchen's order counter, MCP hands your agent the appliances — plus a ten-minute exercise that makes the difference physical.
We used to paste HTML into chat and explain where the login button was, like giving directions to a blindfolded driver. Playwright MCP ends that: your agent gets its own browser — it sees pages, clicks, types, and logs in. Here's the setup, the real workflow from office automation, and the safety rules.