starting out?

[appleraja]

im just curious before u try to learn hiranga, should u beable to read romanji first?

[Harisenbon]

Romaji is just a stepping stone. It is not needed, and definately not recommended (by me). Learn the Hiragana first, then Katakana, then Kanji.

[appleraja]

i can learn the prnounciations but i wont kno much words though

[Daichi]

Whenever someone is just starting out they'll recieve different advice from different people.

Some people like to stick with romaji for quite some time, although most people advise strongly against this, some like to start reading Japanese straight away and others (such as myself) prefer to begin with an audio course, and build up vocabulary before they start reading/writing. Many combine these methods.

I think the best idea is to try out as many different methods as you can (use your local library to save you forking out too much cash early on). Find out which is best for you and stick with that one.

And keep logging into this site, it'll help you greatly along the way!

Also http://www.joewright.org/writings/learnj.html

It's a good reference!