Adverb Advice or Grammar Guru?

So my proof reader asks me what an adverb is. And, well, I don't know. Not exactly. Not really. Now, its not that bad cos I can identify it in a sentence where it's present, but I cannot tell her how I do it or define it. So then I think of nouns. Yes, those are things. She looks at me blankly. Like... chair, table... things like that. Blank stare continues. Names of things... like what you can call them. Those things are nouns. And adjectives are things which describe these things. Like beautiful, ugly, etc. And adverbs... they're well, like in this sentence see, 'slowly' is an adverb. She says ok and gets back to her work.

Here, just a warning. Adverbs. They are tricky little things. Beware of the adverbs.

I still sit thinking about adverbs for the whole day. I think. I ponder. I think I even scratch head and frown, but I'm not sure about that. And somehow through some complex process I realise that adverbs are things which describe verbs. Verbs are doing things. And adverbs describe doing things. Like snoring softly. Snoring is a verb and softly is the adverb. Phew! Mrs. Oommen didn't fail completely.

Then today co-worker asks me what's past perfect tense. How totally inconsiderate! Humph.

And I'm supposed to be an editor. Woe!