A telenovela is a Latin American version of a soap opera.
yes it is . but now are call series
Yes, in Spain they are called culebrones or long snakes because of the twisted plots.
some times they are called  like that because they are long and never ending story
a true telenovela only tells one self contained story over the course of a year or so.
I guess that is the original idea, but to keep a story running for a year or more, they need a lot of side stories
They keep the episodes short typically only 30-45 minutes long, this helps to stretch it out.
at the beginig, is like that, then when the story is close to the end they start cutting it , sometimes because need make time for the next telenovela