There is/ There are -

There is / there are

In your example of there is, Tanya, it is as if the items are
being counted separately:
Theres a chair and theres a table in the room SO theres
a chair and table in the room.
But note:
There are three chairs and a table in the room.
Theres a table and three chairs in the room.
The general rule is that the verb form matches the item(s)
that it is adjacent to:
Either the accused or the witnesses were lying. They couldnt
both be telling the truth.
Either the witnesses or the accused was lying. They couldnt
both be telling the truth.
Note that we do not usually begin sentences in English with an
indefinite noun phrase. We could say:
A knife and (a) fork were on the table.
But we usually dont. If we want to say that something exists,
we usually start the sentence with the empty grammatical
word there and say:
Theres a knife and (a) fork on the table