Popped in to take a seat in awful dive (7)
I believe the answer is:
visited
'popped in' is the definition.
The answer and definition can be both to do with motion as well as being past participle verbs.
Maybe they are linked in a way I don't understand?
'take a seat in awful dive' is the wordplay.
'take a seat' becomes 'sit' (sit down on a seat).
'in' is an insertion indicator.
'awful' indicates an anagram.
'dive' is an anagram of 'vied'.
'sit' placed inside 'vied' is 'VISITED'.
'to' is the link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for visited that I've seen before include "Called in (5)" , "Saw" , "came to see" , "Looked up" , "Went to see" .)