What is history?

How can we define these terms to help make history more approachable and understandable.

History: a record or narrative description of past events, the discipline that records and interprets past events involving human beings, the continuum of events occurring in succession leading from the past to the present and even into the future, all that is remembered of the past as preserved in writing. (from the dictionary)

But lets be serious and consider it again.....what is history?
Is it just the past? A series of the past, present, and future? Each of the prior items mentioned.

What can we learn from the past?

Its not just about the past....but also what is written and studied about the past.

I mean if it is the past, how can we remember it. Yes, there is people who were alive and remember 50 years ago but not 500 years ago. We need some sort of records of information (sources which can vary).