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Simple Past Tense in English The simple past tense represents the actions that occurred and were completed in the past. Get uses and examples of simple past tense. What is Simple Past tense? "The simple past tense represents the actions that occurred and were completed in the past." In the English language, Simple Past tense is used when the action is simply mentioned and understood to have taken place in the past. The action started and ended sometime in the past but the time may or may not be mentioned. In Simple Past Tense it does not matter how long ago the action has taken place: it can be a few minutes or seconds in the past, or millions of years in the past. Also it does not matter how long the event is. It can be a few milliseconds (bomb explosion) or millions of years (Jurassic time). We normally use the simple past tense when: • the event is in the past. • the event is completely finished. • we say the time or place of the past event.