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get to verb phrase (+ verbal noun) To begin to, reach the point of. [this construction is apparently a 19th-century American development]

1859 Taliaferro Fisher's River 79 I had got to turnin' up my nose whenuver Molly sot turkey on the table. 1884 (in 1996 Edmondson Crawford Memoirs 130) On thinking over past events I got to thinking of my Fathers sickness and death. 1939 Hall Coll (Cades Cove TN) We was small, both of us. They got to deviling us about sparking, you know. 1960 Hall Smoky Mt Folks 52 They explained, "we put the woolen cloth (on the chest) when the fever got high or when she got to smotherin'." 1973 GSMNP-5:5 We was a-picking the banjo and playing the fiddle, and we got to picking "Down the Road." 1995 Adams Come Go Home 95 I reckoned that the best thing to do was to get her to dancing.