That night, we danced/we were dancing for a long time.

[Buddy42]

Dear teachers,
being a little confused I'd appreciate an answer to my "problem".

Basically, I know how to use the past progressive. But I'm not sure about its use in the following sentence:

a) That night we were dancing for a long time.

We use the past progressive when we talk about an action in progress at a certain time in the past, like in: At midnight they were (still) dancing.
However, we use the simple past when we talk about a completed action in the past. According to this,

b) "That night we danced for a long time"

would be the only correct answer.

The past progressive sounds nicer to me but I don't know why and may be wrong.

Can you help?

 

[SoothingDave]

It's possible either way. It depends on what you are trying to emphasize. That it was ongoing at the time, or that it is completed now. Context matters, as well. I would expect the progressive version to be followed with something that changed. We were dancing for a long time. And then the aliens suddenly appeared.

 

[Buddy42]

!
That's quite interesting. So, in case there is nothing following like aliens suddenly appearing, the version with the simple past is more natural.
Thus, "It was a wonderful day. Good night, dear diary", cannot compete with the aliens, I suppose.

 

[jutfrank]

So, in case there is nothing following like aliens suddenly appearing

How do you know that? Where did you get this sentence from?

 

[tedmc]

You don't use the past progressive if you can use the simple past tense. The former is used to describe an on-going action in the past and something else crops up.

 

[Buddy42]

How do you know that? Where did you get this sentence from?

Well, the aliens were SoothingDave's idea to give the sentence more context, in a way.
I tried the same by giving the diary context to make clear that the situation was completed in the past.

Sentence a) is, however, describes a longer action in the past, which is why I thought that the past progressive would be an option.
But I think tedmc made it quite clear.

 

[teechar]

A: What were you doing that night that was unusual?
B: That night, we were dancing (for a long time).
----------------------

A: What were you doing when it started raining?
B: We were dancing.
----------------------

A: What were you doing around midnight on Thursday?
B: We were dancing.

Those are all possible, and the past continuous (not simple) is the tense of choice in "B".

 

[5jj]

You don't use the past progressive if you can use the simple past tense.

We can, and do. If we wish to emphasise the (limited) duration of the activity, we use the progressive. Otherwise we don't.

I worked in the garden all day yesterday.
I was working in the garden all day yesterday.

Both are possible.

The former is used to describe an on-going action in the past and something else crops up.

Not necessarily.