Question related to "Past Progressive".

Hi Guys. I've recently started studying "Past Progressive" more thoroughly and experienced some problems with it.
I Started solving an exercise and encountered with some difficulties. Please help me understand better.
The exercise is about Mr.Jones who won 5 Million Dollars and was being interviewed about it.
(Note that the answer can be in Past Simple or Past Progressive).

Interviewer: "What where you doing when you heard the news?"
Mr.Jones: "I was sitting at home with my wife. We were watching TV and drinking coffee."

Past Progressive because sitting, watching and drinking is a longer activity not just a short one unlike the examples below: checked, screamed, phoned, which is Past Simple. These activities HAPPENED ONE AFTER ANOTHER and these were relatively short activities. Mr. Jones was not in the middle of doing these things. He just told the interviewer the things he did one after another.

Notice that they were sitting, watching TV and drinking coffee AT THE SAME TIME

Interviewer: "What where you doing when you heard you won?"

Mr.Jones: "First I checked my lottery ticket. Then I screamed. Finally, I phoned my son to tell him the good news."

Please help me to solve this exercise and explain your answers.
Thanks! :)))

Hope it helps.

Thank you. So from what I understand it pretty much depends on the type of activity and whether the actions took place simultaneously or one after another?