Simple past

Written by qualified Spanish expert Inma Sánchez BA

Last updated: 2019-02-26

The English simple past tense is the most common way of expressing past time, such as for

• actions in the past that took place once, never or several times (habits in the past):
  We visited her parents every weekend back then.
• actions that took place one after another:
  They came in, looked around and then left. 
• actions that interrupt other actions:
  I was eating dinner when the phone rang.

Note the use of two different past tenses: the continuous, background action of eating (in the past progressive) and the one-time action - the phone ringing - interrupting it (in the simple past).

• conditions concerning hypothetical situations, in the if-clause of a conditional sentence:
  If I talked too much, you would tell me to shut up.

Words and phrases like these typically signal the use of the simple past:

Here are some other very simple examples: