Choosing a tense

Question

I am wondering about the once upon a time a king lived in a castle.  Can this be more than one tense.  If it is a story concerning a king who lived in the castle, then it is imperfect.  What if it is about kings in general once upon a time a king lived in a castle, now he lives in a council house.  Does the tense still have to be imperfect, or could it be that that situation is completely changed and it could be past historic.  A bit confused.

Accepted Answer

Bonjour Jennifer !

I like your example ;)
Here the issue is the use of "Il était une fois" which is setting a time duration in which a story is taking place. Therefore, what's going to come straight after is going to be a description or setting of a situation of some kind, and this calls for L'Imparfait in French.

I hope that's helpful!

Answer

With the king it was, "avait vécu".  Why not, "vivait", there or, "se sont habillés", here?

Answer

Bonjour Lanny !

I don't quite follow what you're referring to here, but I'd be happy to answer your question if you could provide me with more context :)

À bientôt !

Answer

First, sorry for the confusion.  I'm always mixing up, "to reside" (habiter) and, "to get dressed" (se habiller) which couldn't have helped my sentence above at all!  (Once upon a time, a king dressed his castle. :)
Second, I *thought* that I had used, "vivait", and the question had corrected me with, "avait vécu", but I have come across the question on another quiz and see that I was wrong about that.
Merci !

Answer

Ok, that makes more sense :)
Thanks for your reply !
Bonne journée !