Without getting technical, you have a argument when a conclusion is said to follow from a set of premises. For a deductive argument, If it in fact follows, the argument is classified as valid. Otherwise the argument is invalid. Inductive arguments are neither valid nor invalid.

To your subquestion- yes, there is a way to tell you have an argument. The conclusion will be preceded by words like, Therefore, So, Thus, Hence, etc.

Without getting technical, you have a argument when a conclusion is said to follow from a set of premises. For a deductive argument, If it in fact follows, the argument is classified as valid. Otherwise the argument is invalid. Inductive arguments are neither valid nor invalid.

To your subquestion- yes, there is a way to tell you have an argument. The conclusion will be preceded by words like, Therefore, So, Thus, Hence, etc.

If you want to get technical, you have an argument when a corresponding conditional is claimed to be a tautology.

Suppose you have a set of propositions denoted by statements A1, A2, A3,... An, which we will call premises, and a proposition denoted by B, which we will call the conclusion, if someone claims the proposition denoted by the statement

"IF A1 & A2 & A3 &... &An THEN B"

is a tautology, then they are claiming the conclusion follows from the premises. Thus they formed an argument.