Peugeot 306 engine management light

I was driving my 306 today, the car was working fine as usual, must of been driving for about half hour driving approx. 30mph, i then stopped and parked up. I returned to the car about 10 - 15mins later started it up and it started shaking quite a bit, this was something that has not happened before so i thought it was not anything major. The car was shaking alot more as i started to pull off, the revs were going up and down but not above 1000rpm as i pulled off the car just cut out. I started it up again and the same thing happened. i had to keeps the revs above 2000rpm otherwise the car would just cut out, there was hardly any power through the gears the sound it made was like a back firing tractor. Engine management light was flashing then it wasnt... its hard to describe the sound it made, can someone please help me with a solution???