During a conversation, someone said:
[bla bla bla bla bla]… et là, mon téléphone sonne.
You’ll find it really useful to learn how to use là like this. It means then here. (This is not the same là that you read about recently in #1029.)
When you’re recounting past events in a conversation, you can use the expressions et là or, more informally, pis là the way English says and then. In the example above, the verb is in the present tense, but it’s understood that the events occurred in the past.
[bla bla bla bla bla]… et là, mon téléphone sonne.
[blah blah blah blah blah]… and then, my phone rang.
Et là and pis là both mean the same thing. Pis là sounds as if it were written pi là. Pis is a spoken contraction of puis.
You can also say là on its own without et or pis before it.
