WordPress Database Posts Table query

Question

This works if I replace $wpdb->posts with the literal table name in the database, but not if I try to switch it over to $wpdb->posts. I thought this is used to solve the databases being named wpgh, wpbs, wphh, or any other combination of wp and some characters.

$results = $wpdb->get_results( 'SELECT * FROM $wpdb->posts WHERE post_type = "page" OR post_type = "post" AND post_status = "publish"');

Am I doing something wrong or is there another way to get the posts table?

Answer 1

Turns out this works.

global $wpdb;
    $postsTable = $wpdb->posts;
    $results = $wpdb->get_results( 'SELECT * FROM '.$postsTable.' WHERE post_type = "page" OR post_type = "post" AND post_status = "publish"');