Although, I've been generally delaying the discussion of objects and classes till now, a little explanation is needed right now so that you can understand lists better. We will still explore this topic in detail in its own chapter.
A list is an example of usage of objects and classes. When you use a variable i and assign a value to it, say integer5 to it, you can think of it as creating an object (instance)i of class (type)int. In fact, you can seehelp(int) to understand this better.
A class can also have methods i.e. functions defined for use with respect to that class only. You can use these pieces of functionality only when you have an object of that class. For example, Python provides anappend method for thelist class which allows you to add an item to the end of the list. For example,mylist.append('an item') will add that string to the listmylist. Note the use of dotted notation for accessing methods of the objects.
A class can also have fields which are nothing but variables defined for use with respect to that class only. You can use these variables/names only when you have an object of that class. Fields are also accessed by the dotted notation, for example,mylist.field .