Why are there 2 past tenses in Spanish? How do I remember the difference between them?

First of all, that's a great question, because knowing the difference between the 2 past tenses in Spanish is really important! Firstly, let's think about why there are 2 different tenses, or what the need is for 2 different ways of saying something about an action in the past. Let's compare english examples to start with:Consider the 2 sentences below: Yesterday I walked to school I walked to school every day. Number 1 is talking about a specific action in the past that is completed. Number 2 however, tells us that the person did this action repeatedly in the past. Now, in these sentences in English the verb 'walked' is the same in both sentences, however, in Spanish, in order to make the difference between these events really obvious they use 2 different verb tenses. There is not necessarily a need to distinguish between these the difference in actions in the past, but instead it is a just another way of perceiving these actions. This is the great thing about learning a new language- you get to understand how other people from other cultures think about things differently to you! So, let's consider now how we might do this in Spanish. Q. If the verb for 'to walk' is 'caminar', how do you think you would say 'I walked' in Spanish, in the preterite tense? (when it only happened once)? How do you think you say it in the imperfect tense? (Where an action is repeated and did not happen at a specific time) A. So, we have caminé and caminaba. Even though they both mean 'I walked', the first tells us that the action happened at one specific time in the past, and the second tells us that you repeated that action a number of times. Recap: Q. Can you tell me what the difference is between the 2 past tenses in Spanish?