Imperfetto

		singular			plural
1st person		ero	I was		eravamo	we were
2nd person		eri	you were (singular)		eravate	you were (plural)
3rd person		era	he/she/it was		erano	they were

Accent falls on the penultimate syllable of each of them, except for erano, whose stressed syllable is the antipenultimate (pronounced "ehrahnoh"). Imperfect tense is usually translated with English simple past, although it expresses the concept of an action carried out in the past which has not necessarily come to an end. In many cases, the English form "I used to be" could be used instead of "I was"; since Italian has no such form, you may translate imperfect tense with both English forms:

ero bravo = I was clever or I used to be clever (the fact of being clever is a condition lasting throughout the time the sentence refers to) era un cattivo studente = he/she was a bad student or he/she used to be a bad student (again, a condition, with no definite end) erano quattro uomini = they were four men (again, a condition lasting throughout the period which the sentence refers to, although the form "they used to be..." would not be proper in this case)

FUTURO

		singular			plural
1st person		sarò	I shall be		saremo	we shall be
2nd person		sarai	you will be (singular)		sarete	you will be (plural)
3rd person		sarà	he/she/it will be		saranno	they will be

All accents fall on the penultimate syllable of each inflection, except sarò and sarà which have an accent on the last syllable (pronounced "sahroh", "sahrah"). In a few cases, Italian future tense might have a meaning of probability, or chance: for example, if the phone rings, the expression sarà Carlo translates the English form it might be Charles.

Passato remoto

		singular			plural
1st person		fui	I was		fummo	we were
2nd person		fosti	you were (singular)		foste	you were (plural)
3rd person		fu	he/she/it was		furono	they were

Accents fall on penultimate syllables, except in fu (only one syllable), obviously carrying stress, and furono, where the antipenultimate syllable is stressed (pronounced "fwrohnoh"). Notice that fu does not have an accented u because there is no other way of pronouncing the word. This tense expresses the fact that the action has ended time ago, and is no longer in progress:

fu un brutto incidente = it was a bad accident (the fact happened long ago, and it is now over) fu un grande musicista = he was a great musician (in the past, meaning "...now he is dead") furono bravi a vincere = they were clever to win (on that specific occasion, not as a lasting condition).

.4 AVERE (TO HAVE) PART I SIMPLE INDICATIVE TENSES

Avere is another auxiliary verb used in compound tenses, therefore it is as much important as the previous one. It is irregular, but less than essere.