Verizon DSL and WRT54GL

Hi all

I'll try and keep this brief. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Friend leaves for Iraq i setup wireless network for him before he
leaves as i have done for myself and others many times.

He has a Westell router/modem ASDL with verizon. I setup a WRT54GL w/
ddwrt v23sp2

Configured the linksys to use the verizon router/modem as a DHCP
client. Gateway, DNS etc all handled via verizon router/modem.

Well it worked fine and i have read others doing this as well. It
crapped out after a couple hrs.

We got on the phone w/ verizon service problems, no worries i think.
Still doesn't work.

Do i need to spoof the MAC address of the verizon router/modem and
configure PPPoe? Start DNS service on the linksys?

or what?

This has turned into the biggest pain ever