when to use fue vs irse

Question

I'm confused in how to determine which of these verbs should be used. For instance I read that: "He just left, but he'll be back soon" is "Acaba de irse pero vuelve pronto." BUT by comparison I read that: "I barely got to the house and the family left." is "Apenas llegue a la casa y la familia se fue."

Help! It seems to be the same use of the English word "left" yet 2 completely different words in Spanish. What would be the rule here?

I'm also confused with fue vs estuvo but will leave that for another question.

Answer 1

It´s the same verb but conjugated for each situation. "Acaba de......" requires an infinitive of any verb. In this case "irse."

"...la familia se fue." Simple past-tense (pretérito) of "irse."

Answer 2

They are the same word. Look up irse in the conjugator; Se fue is the preterite tense of irse. http://www.spanishdict.com/conjugate/irse

As to your other question, estuvo vs fue is the estar vs ser question. Both are preterite tenses for those verbs.

Yes, it's annoying that the preterite tense for ir is the same as the preterite tense for ser. Context tells you which one is meant.