protected member access in inheritance

Yes - and no.
You can access it in the derived class:

public class Base
    {
    protected string myString;
    }
public class Derived : Base
    {
    public Derived()
        {
        myString = "Hello World";
        }
    }

but you can't access it from outside either via the instance object:

private void MyMethod()
    {
    Derived d = new Derived();
    d.myString = "goodbye";  //'MyNameSpace.Base.myString' is inaccessible due to its protection level
    }

Unless you encapsulate it in a property and specify the setter and getter:

private void MyMethod()
        {
        Derived d = new Derived();
        d.MyString = "goodbye";   //All fine
        }
    ...
public class Base
    {
    protected string myString;
    }
public class Derived : Base
    {
    public string MyString { get { return myString; } set { myString = value; } }
    public Derived()
        {
        myString = "Hello World";
        }
    }