The simple past is a verb tense that is used to talk about things that happened or existed before now. Imagine someone asks what your brother Wolfgang did while he was in town last weekend.
Wolfgang entered a hula hoop contest.
He won the silver medal.
The simple past tense shows that you are talking about something that has already happened. Unlike the past continuous tense, which is used to talk about past events that happened over a period of time, the simple past tense emphasizes that the action is finished.
Wolfgang admired the way the light glinted off his silver medal.
You can also use the simple past to talk about a past state of being, such as the way someone felt about something. This is often expressed with the simple past tense of the verb to be and an adjective, noun, or prepositional phrase.
Wolfgang was proud of his hula hoop victory.
The contest was the highlight of his week.
How to Formulate the Simple Past
For regular verbs, add -ed to the root form of the verb (or just -d if the root form already ends in an e):
Play→Played Type→Typed Listen→Listened Push→Pushed Love→Loved
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