If A is a diagonal n x n matrix, A has non-zero elements only at indices (k,k), k belongs to {1, n}
so for a 4x4 matrix it looks like this
a 0 0 0
0 b 0 0
0 0 c 0
0 0 0 d
Tridiagonal matrices can have non-zero elements also at indices (k, k+-1)
so a 4x4 tridiagonal matrix would look like...