Donate Your Car Sacramento

My car is not starting and I am not sure what the issue is. This is a weird set of events so ill try and provide all the details…

Some background. I just bought a used 2004 Nissan Sentra about a year ago. About a month after buying it there were random times where it didnt start. I talked to a friend and he said it sounded like it was the battery. So I went and bought a new battery and kept it around until my friend came back into town (he works out of time a couple days out of the week) before I installed to be sure I even needed to waste the money on a new battery. When he came back he said I didnt need to buy the battery because it was just the corrosive stuff around the posts of the battery. He cleaned it off and I havent had any problem until now.

I decided to keep the new battery around just in case there were future issues with the battery and I would have a back up. I kept it in my trunk for about a day until i could get to my brothers house and store it in his garage. When I did get to my brothers house I figured out the battery had tipped over and some of the liquid in the battery had seeped out. I didnt think it was a big deal so I left it at my brothers. The new battery I purchased had been at my brothers house about 8 months.

The recent events:
I live in San Francisco and was visiting family in Sacramento which is about 100 miles away. On the drive to Sac I stopped to get gas. When I went to turn my car on it didnt start. i checked the battery and there was another build up of stuff on the posts. I cleaned it off and the car started fine. Immediately when I got to my brothers house, which is where I stay when I am out here, I turned my car on and off a couple of times to see if would start which it did.

Skip to a day later when I had this feeling in the back of my head to check and see if my car was still good before I drove back to San Francisco and it would start. I tried to jump my car and it would work so I thought maybe the battery is just dead. So I installed the battery I purchased used distilled water to top off the liquid that had spilled out from before, tried to jump and it didnt work. It just made a couple of clicking sounds and I could tell it was trying to start. I made some calls and I was told that it is because the battery has been sitting for so long and it lost its charge. They advised I let the jumper charge it for awhile and then try and start it. That worked. I unhooked the cables drove around the parking lot for about 5 minutes and then parked. Since I knew the lights drew alot of power from the battery I turned it on to see what happened. Right when I turned the lights on it died. So I let the jumpers sit there for awhile and then tried to start my car and got it turn on. This time I just left my car on and left the cables attached to the battery for about 20 minutes. Then I unhooked the cables and let the car run thinking the alternator would be charger it. After about 10 minutes the car just shut off.

Now I am just confused what the problem is. My thoughts are that maybe the battery is just crappy for sitting there for so long. Or that the altenator is dead and not charging the battery (but why was able to drive around for 5 minutes?) or its the starter. I am not sure what the issues with the starter would sound like but I think it is unlikely the starter since the lights would kill the car when I turned it on which is totally seperate from the starter.

Any thoughts or advice is greater appreciated!
correction:
Skip to a day later when I had this feeling in the back of my head to check and see if my car was still good before I drove back to San Francisco and it “would NOT” start.