Might be kind of familiar to make appeal, they say (4,1,4)
I believe the answer is:
ring a bell
'kind of familiar to make appeal they say' is the definition.
I don't know anything about this answer so I can't judge whether it can be defined by this definition.
'might be' is the wordplay.
I cannot quite see how this works, but
'be' is present in the answer.
This explanation may well be incorrect...
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for ring a bell that I've seen before include "Advice to cyclist" , "to remind one of something" , "Signal to start class" , "faintly resonate" , "What door-to-door salesman's wont to do" .)