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Past continuous and past simple interrupted activities English speakers often use the past simple and past continuous together to say that something happened in the middle of something else. In this episode of The Flatmates, Alice says: 'when I arrived at the restaurant, he was talking to somebody on the phone' This means that Paul started talking on the phone before Alice arrived at the restaurant, and he was still talking when she entered the restaurant. The order of the clauses is not important here. It is possible to change the clause order without changing the meaning of the sentence. 'he was talking to somebody on the phone when I arrived at the restaurant'
'When', 'while' and 'as' 'when', 'while' and 'as' are important time markers. They can be used with the past simple or the past continuous part of the sentence. 'when I arrived at the restaurant, he was talking to somebody on the phone' 'he was talking to somebody on the phone when I arrived at the restaurant ' 'As I was walking down the street, I met my old teacher.' 'I met my old teacher as I was walking down the street.' 'While the teacher was talking, two of the students fell asleep.' 'Two of the students fell asleep while the teacher was talking.'
Past simple The past simple is usually used when things happen one after another. 'She got up, had a shower, got dressed, made breakfast and went to work.'
The Flatmates
Vocabulary dreadful awful, terrible to eavesdrop to listen to another person's conversation without them knowing you are listening Would you like to try an online quiz about this language point? Go to: http://bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/flatmates/episode70/quiz.shtml Or you can download the quiz from: http://bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/flatmates/episode70/quiz.pdf More on this language point: http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/grammar/learnit/learnitv69.shtml
The Flatmates