hwyl wrote:I've heard many people say that 'wnes i gerdded' is the normal spoken Welsh form. However, I work with a range of people of all ages from the south and I'd say that 'cerddais i' is by far the most normal form. I think 'wnes i...' constructions are gaining wider usage that before (included the dreaded 'wnes i wneud'!), through northern school teachers and the media, but first language southern speakers still seem to prefer fully inflected forms.
I'm not even sure that nes i forms are the Northern norm. I come across ddaru even this far east, and I know people who find both nes i and the inflected past weird (but will use inflected future, weirdly). I think nes i is more a feature of media Welsh and second-language teaching than it is of Northern dialects. Presumably there are dialects where it is common - the Northeast for example - but I have a feeling that its spread here has more to do with its preeminence in the media than with its natural use.