The "simple past" is used to talk about an action that ended in a time before the current one. The duration is not relevant. The time in which the action takes place can be the recent past or the distant past. Example John Cabot sailed to America in 1498. My father died last year. He lived in Fiji in 1976. We crossed the Channel yesterday. The "simple past" is always used to refer to when something happened, so it is associated with certain temporal expressions that indicate: Frequency: often, sometimes, always I sometimes walked home at lunchtime. I often brought my lunch to school. A specified time: last week, when I was a child, yesterday, six weeks ago We saw a good film last week. Yesterday, I arrived in Geneva. An undetermined time: the other day, ages ago, a long time ago People lived in caves a long time ago. She played the piano when she was a child. TIME TO PLAY In this link you can put your knowledge into practice...