English people always joke about the phrase, “my husband and I.” On Christmas Day, the Queen would begin a speech to the nation, and it was always said that she would begin with these words. To be honest, I never listened to her speech and never cared very much whether this was true or not.

I have been thinking recently about the way people use “and I” in sentences because I have noticed many people getting it wrong in a way that is, frankly, embarrassing. Perhaps it’s because children are often corrected when they say things like, “Me and my friend went to the playground today.” They are told (rightly) that they’ve made a grammatical mistake and they spend the rest of their lives conscientiously replacing every instance of “me and my friend” with “my friend and I.” You’d think that would solve the problem.

Not so fast! Sometimes “my friend and I” is right, but sometimes you should say “my friend and me.” So, when is it right and when is it wrong? It’s actually quite easy to figure this out, and the way to do it is to forget about your friend. So let’s sort out a few sentences into ones that are quite obviously right or wrong.

RIGHT

  1. I went to the playground.
  2. She hit me.
  3. She went to the playground with me.

WRONG

  1. Me went to the playground.
  2. She hit I.
  3. She went to the playground with I.

Now let’s bring the friend back. Exactly the same rules apply.

RIGHT

  1. My friend and I went to the playground.
  2. She hit my friend and me.
  3. She went to the playground with my friend and me.

WRONG

  1. My friend and me went to the playground.
  2. She hit my friend and I.
  3. She went to the playground with my friend and I.

So, if you’re not sure, just think about how your sentence sounds without the other person!