The most commonly used English verbs:
http://www.acme2k.co.uk/Acme/3star verbs.htm
The 100 most common English verbs:
add, answer, ask, be, believe, borrow, break, bring, buy, can, carry, catch, change, clean, close, complain, cost, cut, dance, do, draw, drink, drive, eat, explain, fail, fall, feel, fill, find, finish, fix, fly, forget, get, give, go, have, hear, hurt, know, learn, leave, like, listen, live, look, lose, love, make, mind, need, open, order, pay, play, put, rain, read, reply, run, say, see, sell, send, shall, sign, sing, sit, sleep, smoke, speak, spend, stand, start, study, succeed, switch, take, talk, teach, tell, think, translate, travel, try, turn, understand, use, wait, wake up, want, watch, will, win, work, worry, write
From:
http://www.acme2k.co.uk/Acme/100.htm
The First 100 Most Commonly Used English Words
http://www.duboislc.org/EducationWatch/First100Words.html
(This list has 300 words in total.)
http://members.tripod.com/jeana_mcqueen/classroom/site_words
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Troy/2059/SIGHTwords.htm
Some interesting history here:
http://students.bath.ac.uk/csmlh/webpage_British.html