I'm sorry you didn't like that simplification. Anyway, it's better than "you have no money but you can make it appear from nowhere and lend it because you are a bank and have special powers".

The more details are given, the less interesting the special powers of commercial banks seem to be: not only is the amount of money that they can create limited to some multiple of the "real money" base, but they don't even lend that much out because it's not profitable.

But the "real money base" will expand on demand if the banks need it. It's not a limiting factor! The loan happens first. The base money is created (if needed) after the fact. It's not as if base money is pushed out there and then the base money is used to create loans. Loans pull base money into being.

It’s not a limiting factor anyway because US banks have 1.4 trillion dollars in excess reserves deposited at the Fed (down from 2.7 trillions five years ago!).

The monetary base (physical currency plus banks deposits at the Fed) is currently $3.3tn.

M1 (circulating cash plus on demand deposits) is $3.9tn (the money multiplier is slightly above 1, but it was below 1 for most of this decade!).

M2 (including also savings accounts) is $14.9tn. M2/MB is 4.5, it has ranged between 3 and 5 over the last 10 years. It was between 8 and 12 in the four decades before 2008.