What is past perfect continuous tense?

It is used to express a continued or ongoing action that began in past and proceeded until at some time in past. (Keep in mind, an ongoing action in past which continued till some time in past) There will be a time reference, for example, "since 1980, for three hours and so on" from which the action had begun. A sense of time reference is found in these sentences which demonstrate that action had begun in past and continued till eventually in past. Such time reference or sense of reference is the identity of Present perfect continuous tense that it tells that action has begun from a specific time in past or for some time period. For example, “He had been reading in this school since 2005”, It means that he had started his education in this school in 2005 and he studied in this school till sometime in past.

Examples:

At that time he had been writing a novel for two months.

I had not been waiting for Karim for one hour.

She had not been playing cards since 7 O’clock.

Had I been living in America since 2003?

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