Before you got it back you should have just cancelled it. eBay don't need to be contacted, you just click 'End Item'. Seriously man, you made this a lot more complicated than it needed to be.
I think on auctions you have more options when you end it, but you can put "item not available" as a reason. I haven't got a running auction to check, but I'm sire there's an easy way to do it!
Before you got it back you should have just cancelled it. eBay don't need to be contacted, you just click 'End Item'. Seriously man, you made this a lot more complicated than it needed to be.