Provided are a method, system, and program performed at a local node to communicate with a remote node. A first communication protocol is used to communicate with the remote node to establish a connection for a second communication protocol. Data structures are created to enable communication with the remote node to establish the connection with the remote node for the second communication protocol. An extension layer is invoked for the second communication protocol. The data structures are passed to the extension layer to use to communicate with the remote node using the second communication protocol.