In Past perfect^x, Contractions^x

Hahah, you two make me laugh with these posts.Yoong, all your emoticons and hyper-links work fine for me. I can click on your links and it brings up the post, just like it's supposed to. About contractions: It depends upon what kind of contraction. Personal pronoun contractions can be used...

WesternAmerican wrote:Why can't I say 'I had lived a life that's full'.Because "that's" is a contraction of "that is" not "that was". You could say "I had lived a life that was full" then X happened and life wasn't full anymore.

Unfortunately "I'd" can in fact have the meaning "I had". For example, "I'd just finished my homework when the doorbell rang." = "I had just finished my homework when the doorbell rang.", which uses "I'd" as the contraction for "I had". (past perfect) You are correct in that "I'd" does mean "I...

Well, I can't speak for everyone, fo course, but yes, I use the past perfect all the time in situations like you describe. But we tend to use contractions - so "she'd left" could, I suppose, be misheard as "she left." (Edited: Oops. I forgot to hit post so Clive gave you a much better answer...

Hi, That's a hard question to ask a native speaker. Here are a few brief and subjective comments. Some people would tell you that the use of Past Perfect is fading. Its use reflects the speaker's education and facility with language. Some people speak poor English, just as I'm sure that some...

Thank you, Tam, for the effort you made to try to let me understand this structure. However ... Tam Sadek wrote: Perhaps this example using the Past Perfect/Past Simple will make it clearer. "We arrived late because our plane had been delayed" versus "We arrived late because our plane was...