We form the past perfect by using âhadâ and the past participle of the verb. For example, âYou had met him before.â. To make questions we invert the auxiliary verb had and the subject: âHad you met him before?â. And to make negative forms we add ânotâ to âhadâ: âYou hadnât met him before.â.
Generally speaking, the imperfect describes past situations, while the passé composé narrates specific events. The passé composé can express any of the examples below, which range from completed actions in the past to actions repeated multiple times in the past, and even a series of actions completed in the past.
You can use the Simple Past tense to talk about those things. This is the most common tense to use when speaking about past experience. Example sentences: I studied English in high school. I got an A in algebra last year. I was #3 in my class freshman year. I worked at Siemens as a Finance Manager and then I moved to Nokia. I became a manager