Trail around shops in light conversation (5,4)
I believe the answer is:
small talk
'light conversation' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'trail around shops' is the wordplay.
'trail' becomes 'stalk' (I can't justify this - if you can you should believe this answer much more).
'around' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'shops' becomes 'mall'.
'stalk' placed around 'mall' is 'SMALL-TALK'.
'in' acts as a link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for small talk that I've seen before include "Social conversation on unimportant matters" , "Unimportant prattle" , "Light conversation" , "Social chat on unimportant matters" , "Polite chit-chat" .)