One of the biggest conceptual problems in switching between English (and French, German, Dutch and Italian to name a few) and Japanese, is that in Japanese, everything that modifies the sentence is at the very end, including the conjugation between tenses and whether the previsous sentence is standing on its own, or was something you said or thought.
Example:
In English you'd say "I went to the store and bought bread"
In Japanese the structure would be: " I go to the store and bought bread" the "going to" remains unconjugated and it is the last verb in the sentence that determines whether the 'going to' is past or present.
This means that in compound sentences, you need to mentally keep track of the various parts, and only know at the end what is going on. Because it could very well be "I go to the store and am buying bread" to turn the 'go to' into 'am going to;.
But wait, there is more
How would you say: I am thinking about going to the store and buying bread?
That's right: I go to the store and am buying bread, I am thinking.
Or: I said I was thinking about going to the store and buying bread.
I go to the store and am buying bread, I am thinking, I said.
And this is why beyond trivial sentences, keeping track of a conversation requires mental gymnastics of Olympic levels.
