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We use the present simple to talk about:
I'm nineteen years old.
I'm a student.
He lives in London.
I play football every weekend.
The human body contains 206 bones.
Light travels at almost 300,000 kilometres per second.
We often use
like sometimes, always and never with the present simple:
I sometimes go to the cinema.
She never plays football.
The past perfect is made from the verb had and the past participle
of a verb:
I had finished the work.
She had gone.
The past perfect continuous is made from had been and the
of a verb:
I had been working there for a year.
They had been painting the bedroom.
The past perfect is used in the same way as the
, but it refers to a time in the past, not the present. We use the past perfect:
When George died, he and Anne had been married for nearly fifty years.
She didn't want to move. She had lived in Liverpool all her life.
For this use, we often use the past perfect continuous:
She didn't want to move. She had been living in Liverpool all her life.
Everything was wet. It had been raining for hours.
He was a wonderful guitarist. He had been playing ever since he was a teenager.
He had written three books and he was working on another one.
My eighteenth birthday was the worst day I had ever had.
I was pleased to meet George. I hadn’t met him before, even though I had met his wife several times.
I couldn't get into the house. I had lost my keys.
Teresa wasn't at home. She had gone shopping.
We often use expressions with for and since with the past perfect:
I was sorry when the factory closed. I had worked there for ten years.
I had been watching that programme every week since it started, but I missed the last episode.
We do not normally use the past perfect continuous with
. We use the past perfect simple instead:
Up until that moment, I'd never believed (NOTbeen believing) in astrology.
Continuous
Simple
We use the past continuous to talk about the
:
The children were doing their homework when I got home.
Compare: The children did their homework when (= after) I got home.
This use of the past continuous is very common at the beginning of a story:
The other day I was waiting for a bus when …
Last week, as I was driving to work, …
It was eight o'clock. I was writing a letter.
Compare: At eight o'clock I wrote (= started writing) some letters.
My head was aching.
Everyone was shouting.
I was practising every day, three times a day.
They were meeting secretly after school.
They were always quarrelling.
The children were growing up quickly.
Her English was improving.
My hair was going grey.
The town was changing quickly.
We do not normally use the past continuous with stative verbs. We use the past simple instead:
When I got home, I really needed (NOTwas needing) a shower
Exercises
We use the simple past to talk about:
I met my wife in 1983.
We went to Spain for our holidays.
They got home very late last night.
When I was a boy, I walked a mile to school every day.
We swam a lot while we were on holiday.
They always enjoyed visiting their friends.
I lived abroad for ten years.
He enjoyed being a student.
She played a lot of tennis when she was younger.
I met my wife a long time ago.
List of irregular verbs
Subtema
