Malfunction Indicator light came on when I started engine. Why does the engine not run?

malfunction of some kind, ok it knows that much, now your to figure wtf is going on, love these electronic cars these days ,This is acting like a security thing, key not connecting with the transponder or whatever recognizes the chip in key coded signal. hope that puts you on the right track for starters

Dear as per the problem you have mentioned here, I think that you should try to check whether the battery attached with your car is alive of gone dead. In that case the car utilizes whole backup of the car to start up and the light starts after the car starts ignition.

If you can get to an auto parts store, most of them will plug in a code reader for free and check for trouble codes. New cars, 96 and later are great when it comes to diagnostics. For around $60 now you can buy a code reader and find out why your check engine light is on, fix the problem, and reset the light.