My take on explaining user stories …

… shortly

A user story has the following structure:

As <role> I want to <do> because the benefit is <description>

A sample:

As a car driver I want to apply for a licence plate online because it saves me a lot of time.

This communicates clearly the intent and the value of a requirement from the issuers point of view.

In general this helps the team to find a common language which should lead to fewer misunderstandings.

Or as a user story:

As a team member I want to understand my mates because then I will not have to rework past tasks due to misunderstandings.