Play ain't about national school with the lead from Brief Encounter? (7)
I believe the answer is:
instant
'brief encounter?' is the definition.
Both the definition and answer are adjectives. Maybe you can see a link between them that I can't see?
'play ain't about national school with the lead' is the wordplay.
'play' is an anagram indicator.
'about' indicates putting letters inside.
'national school' becomes 'ns' (this could be a standard abbreviation which I don't know about).
'with' says to put letters next to each other.
'lead' indicates taking the first letters.
The initial letter of 'the' is 't'.
'aint' anagrammed gives 'itan'.
'itan' placed around 'ns' is 'instan'.
'instan'+'t'='INSTANT'
'from' acts as a link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for instant that I've seen before include "Twinkling of a eye" , "like some coffee?" , "Sort of coffee" , "Fast, flash" , "type of coffee" .)