This is what I mean when I say "Soft / Brush shading". I use a brush to try and give smooth transitions between light and shadow.
This is what I mean when I say "Cel Shading". The colors aren't smoothly transitioning from one to the next and is divided into shapes. "Tones" is the amount of colors I used to represent either the light or shadow (see how there are two colors representing the shadows?).
This is what I mean when I say "Flat Colors". It's just one color for everything in the picture. No shading or anything.