I’ve stumbled with this issue so many times that I decided to post about it.
Highlights:
*America doesn’t necessarily mean the United States (even though in English it usually does).
*Mexico is not part of South nor Central America but North America. It is, however, part of Latin America. Latin America is a cultural subdivision rather than purely geographical.
*Mesoamerica and Central America are not the same thing.
*The continent (or continents) is very, very big. Even “smaller” countries such as Colombia or Ecuador are larger than most European countries. Flying from Mexico City to Sao Paulo is like flying from Mexico City to Frankfurt.