You can add notes to your own entries and put when you start and finish them in the history tab of the pop up that you mark the status and rate things in… but if you want recent, you can go into the widget creator and select completed and see the last 50 things you marked as completed:
https://mydramalist.com/account/widgets
I do HIGHLY recommend making lists for each year, though. I mark when I finish each show as I complete them both on the listing history tab so I can quickly hit the edit pen button from my watchlist AND in the custom lists for the year (I check the widget page-which makes a preview form to just look at without posting-to be sure I am putting everything I watch on my list since short titles sometimes fly past my memory, especially movies if I watch two back to back)… If I don’t mark them as I go, I can’t remember what year I watched anything even a few months later. :)
Edit: to see the notes you left, in your watchlist to the right of “currently watching” (or whichever tab you are in-it takes you to CW to start), it will say View Notes-click that in each tab to see your notes (I tend to put main themes for things I won’t remember from the name like Japanese content, YouTube and other playlist locations/links, and for things I haven’t watched the writer/director/cast or subject matter that makes me want to watch it. Easier to just check my watchlist to go to see where to find a show than to go to every single listing! 😊