When do I need to use the imperfect tense in Spanish?

In Spanish, the imperfect tense is one of the many past tenses. It is mainly used to describe habitual actions in the past (things that used to happen). It can also be used to set the scene in the past, for example, what a person was doing when something else took place. Consider the following examples:1) I used to play football - (Yo) jugaba al fútbol. 2) I was playing football when it started to rain - (Yo) estaba jugando al fútbol cuando empezó a llover. The hard part is remembering when to use the correct tense, once you’ve grasped that, learning the verb endings to correctly conjugate the verb won’t seem so hard!