Dark curtain descends over MacBook Pro screen

While I was watching a TV show. Message in several languages said I needed to hold down power button and restart my computer.
When I did and the light grey screen appeared, It started emitting a series of thee loud beeps. A small light on the front edge blinked along with the beeps.
So I pressed the power button and my MBP immediately shut back down.
Anyone know what's happening?

Hi,
For anyone reading this, I got it solved. In addition to Philp's suggestion, I found mentions of RAM potentially being the problem.
Took to Genius Bar. Genius reseated RAM. Problem seems to have been solved.
(However, quick update note--after that problem, I ended up having to get a new hard drive. Just did that last week. Then computer was acting a bit funky--hard to explain but system taking a bit long to boot up, programs acting strangely, browsers crashing, flash crashing.
Then--the curtain of doom again! Oh, dear. Well, followed on screen instructions and restarted. Things seem to be okay. However, I notice that Chrome browser crashes now, when it never did before. The Aw, Snap! message suggests there may be a corrupted user file but . . .  who really ever knows!?
Thanks for reading, friends.
Toodle-loo.

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