Learning German, advice or help appreciated!

[Aroura]

Anyone wishing to learn German should first read Twain's essay, 'The Awful German Language'.  It is important to know what you're in for.

Boru

I found it rather easy the other way round. Words are often the same or nearly the same, just spelled differently. German grammar is a bit more difficult, but that's about all. Even proverbs have mostly the same meanings. The only difficulties I see are how to spell the vovel mutations for someone speaking english. But that's rather easy too, at least in most cases. If you take the Ö it's spoken like the u in murder. In fact, the deed nearly sounds the same as the german word for the perp: Mörder. The Ä has nearly the same sund as the a in "take". Only the Ü is a bit more difficult. It's closest relative would be the y in syntax.

Also there's some getting used to that there's no universal "the" in German. It's three different gender dependent words.

One of the things I'm struggling the most with right now is Ihr vs Er.  They sound identical to my ear, and the only way to tell the difference is in the context of the verb, like Er hat or irh habt.  He, you, they...ugh.
But since I'm still learning which verb form goes with which pronoun, I find I'm mistaking this one often.   

The die, der, das for "The" is a tad confusing, but after I hear it attached to the noun a handful of times, I find I'm able to remember it reflexively....most of the time.