Volevo in Italian is the first person, past. I had wanted. How would I recognize that? The ending letter o is for me, or rather I, the sujbect of the sentence.. i remember at school learning Latin, amos, amas, amat, meaning I love, you love, he loves (or she or it loves).
The second v indicates the past. Like the English word have. I had wanted.
So my hints, my memory links, are from English, and Latin and French, both of which I learned at school. If your first language is different, or if you are teaching somebody whose first language is different, you would look for different links.
Eventually, you just know what words mean, either from the context, or from familiarity.
I remember spending time in Prague, then Czechoslovakia, I could not understand a word. We drove back into Germany. In the hotel, we got into the lift and I heard two people speaking German. Normally, I would have ignored the German, as being less familiar to me than English.However, suddenly the German was more familiar than Czech, I realised I was listening to the German and understanding it. For a moment it was as if they were speaking English.
That's the stage you want to get to in a foreign language. When you are not aware of the barrier, like a big sign which says, Foreign Language - do nto enter. You don't even have a sign which says, welcome home, a lagnuage you know. You just listen to the meaning.
Subjunctive
What is subjective? Sub, under reality. Your current or previous hopes or beliefs.
The double s in the Italian suggests supposition.
Volevo che tutto andasse bene
I wanted everything to go well. Think - I wanted, past, that everything should/(in my dreams) go well. Andare is to go. andasse is that it should go. que that
Volevo, I wanted, to reach that stage.
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